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OF 

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—   Hi:>  euuis    -> 


JJ 


B  U  N  D  L  1  x\  G  ; 


<^ri0ln>  )|ro0rc!^i$  anXi  BccUne 


AMERICA. 


HENRY  REED  STILES,  M.  J)., 

AUTHOR  OF  IIISTOUV  OF  BROOKLYN,  HISTORY  OF  AVINDSOIt,  CT.,  JTC. 


"I  flud  by  all  historians,  whether  ancient  or  modern,  whom  I  consulted 
In  searchin;;  for  this  work,  the  fact  well  recorded,  and  established  beyond 
all  controversy,  that  the  Yankee  nation  are  a  set  of  talkiu'i:,  guessing', 
swapping  and  bundUng  sons  of  women." 

Grant  Thorburn's  Kotts  on  Jlrginia. 


ALBANY: 
KNICKERBOCKER  PUBLISHING  COMPANY. 

1871. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  CongreBS,  in  the  year  1871, 

By  Henby  R.  Stiles, 
In  the  office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


G/ 


MY  ESTEEMED  FRIEND, 

DEACOJS"  JABEZ  H.  HAYDEN, 

OF  WINDSOR  LOCKS,  CONNECTICUT, 

Whoae  Jealons  love  of  his  native  state,  led  him,  in  defense  of  her  good  tamo, 

to  make  some  strictures  upon  a  statement  relative  to  bundling,  in 

my  History  and  Genealogies  of  Ancient  Windsor,  Conn., 

which  strictures  (made  and  taken  in  the  kindest 

spirit  of  personal  friendship)  set  me  upou 

the  further  investigation  of  this 

interesting  subject. 


Eijijs    (^%^^v>y 


The  rcsalt  of  that  investigation,  and  the  jnstiflcation  (as  I  claim) 
of  my  original  statement, 


MOST    RESPECTFULLY 

DEDICATED 


AUTHOR 


LUt?:j555 


PREFATORY. 


In  the  History  and  Genealogies  of  Andcni 
Windso7'j  Conn.,  published  in  1859,  speaking 
of  the  influence  of  the  old  French  wars  upon 
the  religious,  moral  and  social  life  of  New 
Eugland,  I  used  this  language  : 

"  Then  came  war,  and  young  New  England 
brought  from  the  long  Canadian  campaigns, 
stores  of  loose  camp  vices  and  recklessness, 
which  soon  flooded  the  land  with  immorality 
and  infidelity.  The  church  was  neglected, 
drunkenness  fearfully  increased,  and  social 
life  was  sadly  corrupted.  BuudUng — that 
ridiculous  and  pernicious  custom  which  pre- 


6  Prefatory. 

vailed  among  the  jouiig  to  a  degree  which 
we  can  scarcely  credit — sapped  the  fountain 
of  morality  and  tarnished  the  escutcheons  of 
thousands  of  families." 

Hereupon  there  came  a  buzzing  around 
my  cars.  Divers  good  sons  of  Connecticut 
winced  under  the  soft  impeachment  of  hav- 
ing a  bundling  ancestry,  and  intimated  that 
my  sketch  of  society  in  the  olden  times  was 
somewhat  overdrawn.  In  1861,  an  esteemed 
antiquarian  friend  in  Connecticut  wrote  me 
as  follows :  "  Some  of  your  friends  feel  that, 
in  your  History  of  Windsor,  you  showed  too 
much  inclination  to  malign,  or  at  least 
ridicule,  Connecticut  institutions,  though  I 
think  none  of  them  accuse  you  of  malice 
in  the  matter,  and  they  fear  that  this  sub- 
ject of  bundling  cannot  be  ventilated  with- 


Prefatory.  7 

out  endaugering  the   fair  fame  of  old  Con- 
necticut." 

Upon  that  hint  I  speak.  Although  born 
in  the  city  of  New  York,  I  am  the  son  of 
Connecticut  parents,  and  proud  to  trace  my 
descent  through  six  generations  of  honest, 
hard-working,  God-fearing  Connecticut  yeo- 
manry. By  the  mere  accident  of  birth  I 
cannot  feel  myself  absolved  from  that  alle- 
giance to  the  Wooden  Nutmeg  State,  which  is 
imposed  upon  me  by  the  ties  of  ancestry,  of 
relationship,  of  youthful  associations,  and 
last,  not  least,  by  the  deep  interest  which  I 
have  taken  in  the  history  of  one  of  its  eldest- 
born  towns.  I  am,  indeed,  at  this  day,  to 
all  intents  and  purposes,  as  wholly  and  truly 
a  Connecticut  man  as  if  bom  wthin  her  bor- 
ders ;  and  as  proud  of  her  past,  as  hopeful  of 


8  Prefatory. 

her  future,  and  as  jealous  of  lier  reputatio]i 
as  any  one  could  desire.  I  trust,  therefore, 
that  I  may  be  allowed  to  disclaim  any  "  in- 
clination to  malign,  or  at  least  ridicule  Con- 
necticut institutions,"  a  task  which,  in  my 
case,  would  savor  of  ingratitude,  and  which 
I  should  consider  unworthy  of  my  humble 
pen. 

I  cannot  but  think,  also,  that  those  who 
have  found,  or  think  that  they  have  found, 
an  inimical  design  in  any  pleasantries  in 
which  I  may  have  indulged  while  describing 
the  customs  and  manners  of  by-gone  days  — 
have  betrayed  a  tidn-shinnedness,  and  an 
ignorance  of  the  true  glory  of  Connecti- 
cut history,  when  they  imagine  that  her  fair 
fame  can  be  seriously  tarnished  by  the  fly- 
specks  of  certain  customs — at  no  time  without 


Prefatory.  9 

their  vigorous  opponents — and  long  since 
rendered  obsolete  by  the  march  of  improve- 
ment. 

The  fun  of  the  thing,  however,  is,  that  the 
sentence  which  has  thus  called  forth  the  ani- 
madversions of  the  critics,  will  be  found,  with 
its  context,  on  closer  examination,  to  have 
applied  to  the  New  England  Colonies,  and 
not  to  Connecticut  alone!  In  their  haste  to 
vindicate  the  land  of  steady  habits,  they  seem 
to  have  assumed  more  than  their  share  of 
the  reproach  involved  in  my  simple  historical 
statement. 

As  for  myself,  I  am  no  believer  in  the 
theory  that  the  objectionable  portions  of  his- 
tory should  be  kept  in  the  background,  and 
that  only  the  bright  side  should  be  turned 
towards  the  world.     If,   as  one  has  happily 


IC  Prefatory. 

eaid,  "  history  is  experience  teaching  by  ex- 
ample," we  most  surely  need  to  have  both 
sides  fairly  presented  to  us,  before  we  can 
properly  extract  therefrom  the  lesson  of  good 
or  of  evil  which  is  therein  taught.  It  is  un- 
necessary to  pursue  the  argument  further. 
Suffice  it  to  say,  that  perfection  is  as  little 
to  be  expected  in  the  history  of  a  state  or  a 
community,  as  in  the  life  of  an  individual. 
As  to  our  ancestors,  we  must  take  them  as 
history  shows  them  to  us — "men  of  like 
passions  with  ourselves,"  and  "  in  all  respects 
tempted  as  we  are,"  yet  neither  worse,  nor, 
again,  very  much  purer  or  better  than  our- 
selves. 

In  this  spirit  I  have  undertaken  to  trace, 
in  the  following  pages,  tlie  origin,  progress 
and  decline  of  the  custom   of  bundling   in 


Prefatory.  11 

America,  together  with  such  facts  as  clearly 
prove  that  it  was  not  confined  to  this  conti- 
nent, but  prevalent  in  various  countries  of 
the  world. 

"  HONI  SOIT  QUI  MAL  Y  PENSE." 

H.  R.  S. 


BUNDLING. 


BtTNDLiNG.  "A  man  and  a  woman  lying  on  the  same  bed  with 
their  clothes  on ;  an  expedient  practiced  in  America  on  a 
scarcity  of  beds,  where,  on  sucli  occasions,  husbands  and 
parents  frequently  permitted  travelers  to  bundle  with  their 
wives  and  daughters." —  Orose,  Dictionary  of  the  Vulgar 
Tongue. 

Bundle,  v.  i.  "  To  sleep  on  the  same  bed  without  undressing; 
applied  to  the  custom  of  a  man  and  woman,  especially 
lovers,  thus  sleeping." —  Webster,  1864. 

Bundle,  v.  n.  "  To  sleep  together  with  the  clothes  on."  — 
Worceater,  1864. 

JLjUN'DLING,  as  may  be  seen  from  the  above 
quoted  definitions,  was  practiced  in  two  forms : 
first,  between  strangers,  as  a  simple  domestic 
make-shift  arrangement,  often  arising  from  the 
necessities  of  a  new  country,  and  by  no  means 
peculiar  to  America ;  and,  secondly,  between 
lovers,  who  shared  the  same  couch,  with  the 
mutual  understanding  that  innocent  endearments 
2 


14  Bundling. 

should  not  be  exceeded.  It  was,  however,  in 
either  case,  a  custom  of  convenience. 

We  may  notice,  in  this  connection,  that  it  is 
very  common,  even  at  the  present  day,  in  "Hew 
England,  to  speak  of  one  as  having  "  bundled  in 
with  his  clothes  on,"  if  he  goes  to  bed  without 
undressing ;  as,  for  instance,  if  he  came  home 
drunk,  or  feeling  slightly  ill,  lay  down  in  the 
daytime,  or  in  a  cold  night  found  the  blankets 
too  scanty. 

The  point  which  first  claims  our  attention  in 
the  discussion  of  this  custom,  is  its  probable 
origin^  and  its  antiquity  in 

The  British  Isles. 

For,  though  British  travelers  have  uniformly  en 
deavored  to  fix  the  odium  of  this  custom  upon 
us  their  transatlantic  cousins,  as  being  peculiarly 
"an  American  institution,"  it  is,  nevertheless, 
an  indisputable  fact  that  bundling  has  for  cen- 
turies   flourished   within   their    own   kingdom. 


Bundling.  16 

For  what  else,  in  fact,  was  that  universal  custom 
of  promiscuous  sleeping  together  which  prevailed 
among  the  ancient  Britons  at  the  time  of  the 
Roman  conquest,  and  which  led  Csesar  to  con- 
sider them  as  polyandrous  polygamists,  and  other 
ancient  writers  to  give  them  an  unenviable  cha- 
racter for  morality  ?  *  Bundling,  of  course  !  in 
its  rudest  aboriginal  form. 

As  to  its  moral  aspects,  being  more  charitably 
inclined  towards  our  British  friends  than  they 
oftentimes  are  to  us,  we  are  willing  to  accept 
Logan's  defense  of  their  ancestors.  "  The  cus- 
tom," he  says,  "  which  continued  until  lately  in 
some  parts,  and  yet  exists  among  a  few  of  the 


*  CoRsar  says,  that  several  brothers,  or  a  father  and  his  sons, 
would  have  but  one  wife  among  them.  Solinus,  indeed,  says 
that  the  women  in  Thule  were  common,  the  king  having  a 
free  choice;  and  Dio  says  the  Caledonians  had  wives  in  com- 
mon ;  yet  these  assertions  may  well  bo  disputed.  Strabs 
desciibes  the  Irish  as  exti'emely  gross  in  this  matter ;  0'  Conner 
says  polygamy  was  permitted ;  and  Derrick  tells  us  they  ex- 
changed wives  once  or  twice  a  year ;  while  Campion  says 
they  only  married  for  a  year  and  a  day,  sending  their  wives 
home  again  for  any  slight  offense. —  Logan's  Scottish  Oael, 
6th  Am.  "(l.,  p.  472. 


16  Bundling. 

rudest,  wlio  sleep  altogether  on  straw  or  rushes, 
according  to  the  general  ancient  practice,  there 
is  reason  to  believe,  led  to  the  aspersion  cast  on 
the  British  and  Irish  tribes.  How  natural  it 
must  have  been  for  a  casual  observer  to  suppose, 
from  seeing  men  and  women  reposing  in  the 
same  place,  that  the  marriage  rites  Avere  not  in 
force.  To  judge  of  the  ancient  inhabitants  by 
the  rudest  of  the  present  Highlanders  and  Irish, 
who  often  sleep  in  the  same  apartment,  and  are 
sometimes  exposed  to  each  other  in  a  state  of 
semi-nudity,  we  should  not  come  to  a  conclusion 
unfavorable  to  their  morality,*  for  this  mode  of 


*  A  History  of  the  Hlglilands,  ami  of  the  Highland  Clans,  etc., 
(Jas.  Browne,  LL.D.,  Advocate,  4  vols.  Londou,  1853),  IV, 
398. 

"The  law  of  marriage  observed  in  tlie  Highlands  has  fre- 
quently been  as  little  understood  as  that  of  succession,  and 
•irailar  misconceptions  have  prevailed  regarding  it.  This  was, 
iierhaps,  to  be  expected.  In  a  country  where  a  bastard  son 
was  often  found  in  undisturbed  possession  of  the  chlefship 
or  property  of  a  clan,  and  where  such  bastard  generally  re- 
ceived the  support  of  the  clansmen  against  the  claims  of  the 
feudal  heir,  it  was  natural  to  suppose  that  very  loose  notions  of 
succession  were  entertained  by  the  people ;  that  legitimacy  con- 
ferred no  exclusive  rights ;  and  that  the  title  founded  on  birth 


Bundles  G.  17 

life  is  not  productive  of  that  conjugal  infidelity 
which  St.  Jerome  and  others  insinuate  as  preva- 


alone  might  be  set  aside  in  favor  of  one  having  no  other  claim 
than  that  of  election.  But  this,  although  a  plausible,  would 
nevertheless  be  an  erroneous  supposition.  The  person  here 
considered  as  a  bastard',  and  described  as  such,  was  by  no  means 
viewed  in  the  same  light  by  the  Highlanders,  becautjc,  accord- 
ing to  their  law  of  marriage,  which  was  originally  very  differ- 
ent from  the  feudal  system  in  this  matter,  his  claim  to  legiti- 
macy was  as  undoubted  as  that  of  the  feudal  heij-  afterward 
became.  It  is  well  known  that  the  notions  of  the  Highlanders 
were  peculiarly  strict  in  regard  to  matters  of  hereditary  suc- 
cession, and  that  no  people  on  earth  was  less  likely  to  sanction 
any  flagrant  deviation  from  what  they  believed  to  be  the 
right  and  true  line  of  descent.  All  their  peculiar  habits, 
feelings  and  prejudices  were  in  direct  opposition  to  a  practice 
which,  had  it  been  really  acted  upon,  must  have  introduced 
endless  disorder  and  confusion,  and  hence  the  natural  ex- 
planation of  this  apparent  anomaly  seems  to  be,  what  Mr. 
Skene  has  stated,  namely,  that  a  person  who  was  feudally  a 
bastard  might  in  their  view  be  considered  as  legitimate,  and 
therefore  entitled  to  be  supported  in  accordance  with  their 
strict  ideas  of  hereditary  right,  and  their  habitual  tenacity 
of  whatever  belonged  to  their  ancient  usages.  Nor  is  this 
mere  conjecture  or  hypothesis.  A  singular  custom  regarding 
marriage,  retained  till  a  late  period  amongst  the  Highlandc^rs, 
and  clearly  indicating  that  their  law  of  marriage  originally 
differed  in  some  essential  points  from  that  established  undei 
the  feudal  system,  seems  to  afford  a  simple  and  natural  ex- 
planation of  the  difficulty  by  which  genealogists  have  been 
80  much  puzzled. 

"  This  custom  was  termed  hand-fasting,  and  consisted  in  a 
species  of  contract  between  two  chiefs,  by  which  it  was  agreed 


18  Bundling. 

lent  amoug  the  old   Scots.     *     *     *    i^Tati  >u8 
that  are  even  in  a  savage  state  are  sometimes 


that  the  heir  of  one  should  live  with  the  daughter  of  the  other 
as  her  husband  for  twelve  months  and  a  day.  If,  in  that 
time,  the  lady  became  a  mother,  or  proved  to  be  with  child  the 
marriage  became  good  in  law,  even  although  no  priest  had 
performed  the  marriage  ceremony  in  due  form ;  but  should 
there  not  have  occurred  any  appearance  of  issue,  the  contract 
was  considered  at  an  end,  and  each  party  was  at  liberty  to 
marry  or  hand-fast  with  any  other.  It  is  manifest  that  the 
practice  of  so  peculiar  a  species  of  marriage  must  have  been 
in  terms  of  original  law  among  the  Highlanders,  otherwise  it 
would  be  difficult  to  conceive  how  such  a  custom  could  have 
originated,  and  it  is  in  fact  one  which  seems  naturally  to  have 
arisen  from  the  form  of  their  society,  wliich  rendered  it  a  matter 
of  such  vital  importance  to  secure  the  lineal  succession  of  their 
chiefs.  It  is  perhaps  not  improbable  that  it  was  this  peculiar 
custom  which  gave  rise  to  the  report  handed  down  by  the 
Roman  and  other  historians,  that  the  ancient  inhabitants  of 
Great  Britain  liad  their  wives  in  common,  or  that  it  was  the 
foundation  of  that  law  of  Scotland  by  which  natural  children 
became  legitimatized  by  subsequent  marriage,*  And  as 
this  custom  remained  in  the  Highlands  until  a  very  late  period, 
the  sanction  of  ancient  custom  was  sufficient  to  induce  them 


*  This  is  a  mittake  iu  point  uf  law.  The  principle  of  legitimation  by 
subsequent  marriage,  was  first  explicitly  announced  in  an  imperial  con- 
stitution of  Coustantine,  and  being  wisely  recognized  by  the  church,  It  was 
adopted  by  the  canonists,  through  whom  it  passed  into  our  law.  Th6 
attempt  to  introduce  it  into  Euglnud  failed,  in  consequence  of  the  attach- 
ment of  the  people  to  their  ancient  Saxon  constitutions;  and  hence, 
although  it  was  recognized  in  the  statutes  of  Merton,  it  was  subsequently 
Cb8carded,*and  never  afterwards  found  admission  into  the  municipal  sys- 


Bundling.  19 

found  more  seusitive  on  that  point  of  honor  than 
nations  more  advanced  in  civilization ;  and  ail, 


to  persist  in  regarding  the  offspring  of  such  marriages  as 
legitimate."* 

It  appears,  indeed,  that  as  late  as  the  sixteenth  century,  the 
issue  of  a  hand-fast  marriage  claimed  the  earldom  of  Suther- 
land. The  claimant,  according  to  Sir  Robert  Gordon,  de- 
scribed himself  as  one  lawfully  descended  from  his  father, 
John,  the  third  earl,  because,  as  he  alleged,  "  his  mother  was 
hand-fuited  and  fiauced  to  his  fatlier ; "  and  his  claim  was 
bought  off  (which  shows  that  it  was  not  considered  as  alto- 
gether incapable  of  being  maintained)  by  Sir  Adam  Gordon, 
who  had  married  the  heiress  of  Earl  John.  Such,  then, 
was  the  nature  of  the  peculiar  and  temporary  connection 
which  gave  rise  to  the  apparent  anomalies  which  we  have 
been  considering.  It  was  a  custom  which  had  for  its  object, 
not  to  interrupt  but  to  preserve  the  lineal  succession  of  the 
chiefs,  and  to  obviate  the  veiy  evil  of  which  it  is  conceived  to 
afford  a  glaring  example.  But  after  the  introduction  of  the 
feudal  law,  which,  in  this  respect,  was  directly  opposed  to  the 
ancient  Highland  law,  the  lineal  and  legitimate  heir,  accord- 
ing to  Highland  principles,  came  to  be  regarded  as  a  bastard 
by  the  government,  which  accordingly  considered  him  as 
thereby  incapacitated  for  succeeding  to  the  honors  and  pro- 
perty of  his  race ;  and  hence  originated  many  of  those  disputes 
concerning  succession  and  chiefship,  which  embroiled  families 
with  one  another,  as  well  as  with  tlie  government,  and  were 


tem  of  the  neighboring  kingdom.    There  can  bo  no  doubt  whatever  that 
the  principle  le  one  which  rtneon,  morality  and  religion  mast  equally 
approve. 
•  Skene's  UighJcmders  of  Scotland,  vol.  I,  clmp.  vii,  166, 167. 


20  Bundling. 

jerhaps,  that  cau  be  admitted  is,  that  certain 
formalities  may  have  been  practiced  by  the 
Britons,  from  which  the  bundling  of  the  Welsh, 
and  the  hand-fasting  in  some  parts  of  Scotland, 
are  derived.  The  conversation  v^^hich  took  place 
between  the  Empress  Julia  and  the  wife  of  a 
Caledonian  chief,   as  related  by  Xiphilin,  cer- 


productive  of  incredible  disorder,  mischief  and  bloodshed. 
No  allowance  was  made  for  the  ancient  usages  of  the  people, 
which  were  probably  but  ill  understood ;  and  the  rights  of 
rival  claimants  were  decided  according  to  the  principles  of  a 
foreign  system  of  law,  which  was  long  resisted,  and  never 
admitted  except  from  necessity.  It  is  to  be  observed,  how- 
ever, that  the  Highlanders  themselves  di'ew  a  broad  distinc- 
tion between  bastard  sous  and  the  issue  of  the  hand-fast 
unions  above  described.  The  former  were  rigorously  ex- 
cluded from  every  sort  of  succession,  but  the  latter  were 
considered  as  legitimate  as  the  offspring  of  the  most  regularly 
solemnized  marriage. 

This  practice  obtained  not  only  among  chiefs,  but  common 
people. 

Walter  Scott,  in  the  xxv  chapter  of  the  Monastery^  in  a 
note,  says :  "This  custom  of  hand-fasting  actually  prevailed 
in  the  upland  days.  It  arose  partly  from  the  want  of  priests. 
While  the  convents  subsisted,  monks  were  detached  on  regulai 
cu'cuits  through  the  wilder  districts,  to  marry  those  who  had 
lived  in  this  species  of  connexion.  A  practice  of  the  same 
kind  existed  in  the  Isle  of  Portland." 


Bundling.  21 

taiuly  evinces  a  grossness  and  indelicacy  in  the 
amours  of  the  British  ladies,  if  true ;  but  it  ap- 
pears to  be  a  reply  where  wit  and  reproof  were 
more  aimed  at  than  truth.  The  case  of  the  Em- 
press Cartismandua  shows  the  nice  feeling  of  the 
Britons  as  to  the  propriety  of  female  conduct. 
The  respect  of  the  Germans  for  their  femal  es, 
and  the  severity  with  whicli  they  visited  a  devia- 
tion from  virtue,  have  been  described;  and  the 
further  testimony  of  Tacitus  may  be  adduced, 
who  says  that  but  very  few  of  the  greatest  dig- 
nity chose  to  have  more  than  one  wife,  and  when 
they  did  it  was  merely  for  the  honor  of  alliance. 
It  may  be  here  stated  that  the  Gaels  have  no 
word  to  express  cuckold,  and  that  prostitutes 
were,  by  Scots'  law,  like  that  of  the  ancient 
Germans,  thrown  into  deep  wells;  and  a  woman 
was  not  permitted  to  complain  of  an  assault  if 
she  allowed  more  than  one  night  to  elapse  before 
the  accusation."  —  Logan's  Scottish  Gael,  5th  Am. 
edition,  p.  472.* 


In  Scottish  Ballads  and  Songs,  by  James  Maidment,  Edin- 


22  Bundling. 

Indeed,  whatever  may  have  been  the  real  state 
of  morality  among  the  ancient  Scotch  and  Irish — 
and  it  is  quite  probable  that  it  has  been  unfairly 
depicted  by  casual  and  prejudiced  observers  — 
the  ancient  custom  of  bundling,  which  has  been 
handed  down  from  earliest  times,  has  not  greatly 
contaminated  their  descendants  of  the  present 
day.  For,  whatever  their  national  vices,  the 
Scotch  and  Irish  of  our  day  maintain  a  character 
for  chastity  superior  to  that  of  man^'^  of  their 
more  fortunate  and  more  civilized  neighbors. 
Bundling,  as  now  practiced  in  these  kingdoms,  is 


burgh,  MDCCCLIX,  under  the  title  of  Luckidad's  Garland,^. 
134,  is  a  remarkable  picture  of  the  old  and  new  times  in  Scot- 
land, eighty  or  ninety  years  ago,  three  of  the  twenty-four 
vei'ses  of  which  the  ballad  is  composed,  being  descriptive  of 
something  akin  to  bundling.  In  a  London  edition  of  Hudibras, 
also,  published  in  1811,  is  a  note  to  line  913,  of  Part  I,  Canto 
I.  As  both  of  these  extracts,  however,  are  somewhat  too 
broad  for  our  pages,  we  content  ourselves  with  simply  referring 
thereto.  In  the  same  category,  also,  is  the  definition,  in 
Bailey\'i  Old  English  Dictionary,  of  the  teriu  free  bencJi,  as  pre- 
vailing in  the  manors  of  East  and  West  Embourn,  Chaddle- 
worth  in  the  county  of  Berks,  Tor  in  Devonshire,  and  other 
places  of  the  west. 


Bundling.  23 

merely  a  matter  arising  from  the  ignorance,  or 
the  poverty  of  the  inhabitants ;  and,  while  not 
salutary  in  its  moral  or  physical  influence,  is,  at 
all  events,  less  abused  than  we  might  reasonably 
expect. 
In  regard  to 

Wales. 

"We  learn  from  "Woodward's  admirable  history 
of  that  kingdom,  the  following  facts  concerning 
the  domestic  habits  of  its  people  in  the  twelfth 
century  : 

"At  night  a  bed  of  rushes  was  laid  down  along 
one  side  of  the  room,  covered  with  a  coarse  kind 
of  cloth,  made  in  the  country,  called  hrychan; 
and  all  the  household  lay  down  on  this  bed  in 
common,  without  changing  their  dresses.  The 
fire  was  kept  burning  through  the  night,  and  the 
sleepers  maintained  their  warmth  by  lying 
closely ;  and  when,  by  the  hardness  of  their 
couch,  one  side  was  wearied,  they  would  get  up  and 


24  Bundling. 

sit  by  the  fire  awhile,  and  theu  lie  down  again  or 
the  other  side.  It  is  to  this  custom  of  promiscu- 
ous sleeping,  that  some  of  the  worst  habits  of  the 
Welsh  at  the  present  day  may  be  ascribed ;  and 
from  the  same  custom  which  their  forefathers, 
the  ancient  Britons,  practiced,  arose  Caesar's 
supposition  that  they  were  polyandrous  polyga- 
mists." 

These  habits,  which  were  a  matter  of  neces- 
sity with  the  ancient  Welsh,  have  become  con- 
verted, by  the  lapse  of  time,  among  their  de- 
scendants of  the  present  day,  into  an  ama.tory 
custom  precisely  similar  to  that  practiced  form- 
erly in  New  England.* 


*  History  of  Wales  (by  B.  B.  Woodward,  B.A.,  London, 
1853),  p.  320 ;  who  adds,  also,  p.  186,  the  following : 

"  The  laws  which  treat  of  the  violation  of  the  marriage 
bond  and  those  which  relate  to  chastity  generally,  recognize 
a  degree  of  laxity  respecting  female  honor,  and,  yet  more  re- 
markably, an  absence  of  feminine  delicacy,  such  as  could 
scarcely  be  paralleled  amongst  the  most  uncivilized  people 
now.  They  are  of  such  a  nature,  that  though  most  character- 
istic, they  must  be  passed  by  with  this  general  mention.  The 
distinction  between  the  Celtic  and  Teutonic  races  is  perhaps 
in  no  case  more  plainly  marked  than  in  this:  The  Anglo- 
Saxon   hiAvs  on  this  subject  (always  excepting  those  of  the 


Bundling.  25 

A  tourist  tlirough  Wales,  in  the  year  1797,* 
thus  speaks  of  the  Welsh  bundling :  "  And  here, 
amongst  the  usages  and  customs,  I  must  not 
omit  to  inform  you  that  what  you  have,  perhaps, 
often  heard,  without  believing,  respecting  the 
irifide.  of  courtship  amongst  the  Welsh  peasants,  is 
true.  The  lower  order  of  people  do  actually 
carry  on  their  love  affairs  in  bed,  and  what  would 
extremely  astonish  more  polished  lovers,  they 
are  carried  on  honorably,  it  being,  at  least,  as 
usual  for  the  Pastoras  of  the  mountains  to  go 
from  the  bed  of  courtship  to  the  bed  of  marriage 
as  unpolluted  and  maidenly  as  the  Chloes  of 
fashion ;  and  yet  you  are  not  to  conclude  that 
this  proceeds  from  their  being  less  susceptible  of 
the  belle-passion  than  their  betters;  or  that  the 
cold  air  which  they  breathe  has  *  froze  the  genial 
current  of  their  souls.'     By  no  means ;   if  thev 


ecclesiastical  authorities)  are  modesty  itself,  notwithstanding 
their  plain  speaking,  compared  with  those  of  the  Welsh 
legislators." 

*  Oleaninfjs  through  Wales,  Holland,  and  Westphalia,  etc.  (3d 
edition,  by  Mr.  Pratt,  London,  1797),  I,  pji.  105-107. 

:5 


26  Bundling. 

cannot  boast  the  voluptuous  languor  of  an  Italian 
sky,  they  glow  with  the  bracing  spirit  of  a  more 
invigorating  atmosphere.  1  really  took  some 
pains  to  investigate  this  curious  custom,  and 
after  being  assured,  by  many,  of  its  veracity,  had 
an  opportunity  of  attesting  its  existence  with  mj" 
own  eyes.  The  servant  maid  of  the  family  I 
visited  in  Caernarvonshire,  happened  to  be  the 
object  of  a  young  peasant,  who  walked  eleven 
long  miles  every  Sunday  morning  to  favor  his 
suit,  and  regularly  returned  the  same  night 
through  all  weathers,  to  be  ready  for  Monday's 
employment  in  the  fields,  being  simply  a  day 
laborer.  He  usually  arrived  in  time  for  moi'ning 
service,  which  he  constantly  attended,  after 
which  he  escorted  his  Dulcinea  home  to  the 
house  of  her  master,  by  whose  permission  they 
as  constantly  passed  the  succeeding  hour  in  bed, 
according  to  the  custom  of  the  country.  These 
tender  sabbatical  preliminaries  continued  with- 
out interruption  near  two  years,  when  the  treaty 
of  alliance  was  solemnized  ,  and,  so  far  from  an^ 


Bundling.  27 

breach  of  articles  happening  in  the  meantime,  it 
is  most  likely  that  it  was  considered  bj  both 
parties  as  a  matter  of  course,  without  exciting 
any  other  idea.  On  speaking  to  my  friend  (^n 
the  subject,  he  observed  that,  though  it  certainly 
appeared  a  dangerous  mode  of  making  love,  he 
had  seen  so  few  living  abuses  of  it,  during  six  and 
thirty  years'  residence  in  that  country,  where  it 
nevertheless  had  always,  more  or  less,  prevailed, 
he  must  conclude  it  was  as  innocent  as  any  other. 
One  proof  of  its  being  thought  so  b}'  the  parties, 
is  the  perfect  ease  and  freedom  with  which  it  is 
done;  no  awkwardness  or  confusion  appearing 
on  either  side ;  the  most  well-behaved  and  decent 
young  woman  going  into  it  without  a  blush,  and 
they  are  by  no  means  deficient  in'  modesty. 
"What  is  pure  in  idea  is  always  so  in  conduct, 
since  bad  actions  are  the  common  consequence 
of  bad  thoughts;  and  though  the  better  sort  of 
people  treat  this  ceremony  as  a  barbarism,  it  is 
very  much  to  be  doubted  wliether  m.ovQ  faux  pas 
have  been  committed  by  tlie  Cambrian  boors  in 


28  Bundling. 

this  free  access  to  the  bed  chambers  of  their  mis- 
tresses,  than  by  more  fashionable  Strephons  and 
their  nymphs  in  groves  and  shady  bowers.  The 
power  of  habit  is  perhaps  stronger  than  the 
power  of  passion,  or  even  of  the  charms  which 
inspire  it ;  and  it  is  sufficient,  almost,  to  say  a 
thing  is  the  custom  of  a  country,  to  clear  it  from 
any  reproach  that  would  attach  to  an  innovation. 
Were  it  the  practice  of  a  few  only,  and  to  be 
gratified  by  stealth,  there  would,  from  the  strange 
construction  of  human  nature,  be  more  cause  of 
suspicion  ;  but  being  ancient,  general,  and  carried 
on  without  difficulty,  it  is  probably  as  little  dan- 
gerous as  a  ttte  a  ttle  in  a  drawing-room,  or  in 
any  other  full  dress  place  where  young  people 
meet  to  say  soft  things  to  each  other." 

In  an  antiquarian  tour  by  the  Hgv.  W".  Biiig- 
ley,  in  1804,*  we  also  find  the  following  descrip- 
tion of  this  custom  :  "  The  peasantry  of  part  of 


*  North  Wales,  including  its  Scenery,  Antiquities,  Customs 
etc.  (by  Rev.  W.  "W.  Bingley,  A.M.,  2  vols.,  8vo,  London, 
1804),  II,  p.  283. 


Bundling.  29 

Caern'irvonshire,  Anglesea,  and  Merionethshire, 
adopt  a  mode  of  courtship  which,  till  within  the 
last  few  years,  was  scarcely  even  heard  of  in 
England.  It  is  the  same  that  is  common  in 
many  parts  of  America,  and  termed  by  the  in- 
habitants of  that  country,  bundling.  The  lover 
steals,  under  the  shadow  of  the  night,  to  the  bed 
of  the  fair  one,  into  which  (retaining  an  essential 
part  of  his  dress)  he  is  admitted  without  any 
shyness  or  reserve.  Saturday  or  Sunday  nights 
are  the  principal  times  when  this  courtship  takes 
place,  and  on  these  nights  the  men  sometimes 
walk  from  a  distance  of  ten  miles  or  more  to 
visit  their  favorite  damsels.  This  strange  custom 
seems  to  have  originated  in  the  scarcity  of  fuel, 
and  in  the  unpleasantness  of  sitting  together  in 
the  colder  part  of  the  year  without  a  fire.  Much 
has  been  said  of  the  innocence  with  which  these 
meetings  are  conducted,  but  it  is  a  very  common 
thing  for  the  consequence  of  the  interview  to 
make  its  appearance  in  the  world  within  two  or 
three  months  after  the  marriage  ceremony  haa 


30  Bundling. 

taken  place.  The  subject  excites  no  particular 
attention  among  the  neighbors,  provided  the 
marriage  be  made  good  before  the  living  witness 
is  brought  to  light.  Since  this  custom  is  entirely 
confined  to  the  laboring  classes  of  the  commun- 
ity, it  is  not  so  pregnant  with  danger  as,  on  a 
first  supposition,  it  mig-lit  seem.  Both  parties 
are  so  poor  that  they  are  necessarily  constrained 
to  render  their  issue  legitimate,  in  order  to  secure 
their  reputation,  and  with  it  a  mode  of  obtaining 
a  livelihood." 

Another  traveller*  also  mentions  "  a  singular 
custom  that  is  said  to  prevail  in  "Wales,  relating 
to  their  mode  of  courtship,  which  is  declared  to 
be  carried  on  in  bed;  and,  what  is  more  extra- 
ordinary, it  is  averred  that  the  moving  tale  of 
love  is  agitated  in  that  situation  without  en- 
dangering a  breach  in  the  preliminaries."  Re- 
ferring to  Mr.  Pratt's  account  of  the  custom, 
before  quoted,  he  proceeds  to  remark:    "Our 


*  A  Tour  througliout  North  Wales  and  Monmozithshire,  etc, 
etc.  (by  J.  T.  Barbor,  F.S.A.,  London,  1803),  pp.  103-9. 


Bundling.  31 

companion,  like  every  one  else  that  we  .poke 
with  in  Wales  on  the  subject,  at  once  denied  the 
existence  of  this  custom :  that  maids  in  many 
instances  admitted  male  bed-fellows,  he  did  not 
doubt;  but  that  the  procedure  was  sanctioned 
by  tolerated  custom  he  considered  a  gross  misre- 
presentation. Yet  in  Anglesea  and  some  parts 
of  North  Wales,  where  the  original  simplicity  of 
manners  and  high  sense  of  chastity  of  the  natives  is 
retained,  he  adrriitted  something  of  the  kind  might 
appear.  In  those  thinly  inhabited  districts  a 
peasant  often  has  several  miles  to  walk  after  the 
hours  of  labor,  to  visit  his  mistress ;  those  who 
have  reciprocally  entertained  the  beUe  passion 
will  easily  imagine  that  before  the  lovers  grow 
tired  of  each  other's  company  the  night  will  be 
far  enough  advanced ;  nor  is  it  surprising  that 
a  tender-hearted  damsel  should  be  disinclined  to 
turn  her  lover  out  over  bogs  and  mountains  un- 
til  the  dawn  of  day.  The  fact  is,  that  under 
such  circumstances  she  admits  a  consors  lecti,  but 
not  in  nudatum  corpus.     In  a  lonely  Welsh  hut 


32  Bundling. 

this  bedding  has  not  the  alarm,  of  ceremony; 
from  sitting,  or  perhaps  lying,  on  the  hearth, 
they  have  only  to  shift  their  quarters  to  a  heap 
of  straw  or  fern  covered  with  two  or  three  blank- 
ets in  a  neighboring  corner.  The  practice  only 
takes  place  with  this  view  of  accommodation." 

Still  another  glimpse  of  this  favorite  Welsh 
custom  is  presented  by  a  tourist  in  1807.*  He 
says : 

"  One  evening,  at  an  inn  where  we  halted,  we 
heard  a  considerable  bustle  in  the  kitchen,  and,- 
upon  enquiry,  I  was  let  into  a  secret  worth  know- 
ing. The  landlord  had  been  scolding  one  of  his 
maids,  a  very  pretty,  plump  little  girl,  for  not 
having  done  her  work;  and  the  reason  which 
she  alleged  for  her  idleness  was,  that  her  master 
having  locked  the  street  door  at  night,  had  pre- 
vented her  lover  enjoying  the  rights  and  delights 
of  bundling,  an  amatory  indulgence  which,  con- 
sidering that  it  is  sanctioned  by  custom,  may  be 


*lhe  Stranger  in  Ireland,  by  John  Carr. 


Bundling.  33 

regarded  as  somewhat  singular,  although  it  is  not 
exclusively  of  Welsh  growth.  The  process  is 
very  simple  ;  the  gay  Lothario,  when  all  is  silent, 
steals  to  the  chamber  of  his  mistress,  who  re- 
ceives him  in  bed,  but  with  the  modest  precau- 
tion of  wearing  her  under  petticoat,  which  is 
always  fastened  at  the  bottom — not  unfrequently, 
I  am  told,  by  a  sliding  knot.  It  ma}'  astonish  a 
London  gallant  to  be  told  that  this  extraordinary 
experiment  often  ends  in  downright  wedlock  — 
the  knot  which  cannot  slide.  A  gentleman  of 
respectability  also  assured  me  that  he  was  obliged 
to  indulge  his  female  servants  in  these  nocturnal 
interviews,  and  that  too  at  all  hours  of  the  night, 
otherwise  his  whole  family  would  be  thrown  into 
disorder  by  their  neglect;  the  carpet  would  not 
be  dusted,  nor  would  the  kettle  boil.  I  think 
this  custom  should  share  the  fate  of  the  northern 
Welsh  goats.  *  *  *  Habit  has  so  recon- 
ciled the  mind  to  the  comforts  of  bundling,  that 
a  young  lady  who  entered  the  coach  soon  afi^er 
we  left  Shrewsbury,  about  eighteen  years  of  age, 


34  Bundling. 

with  a  serene  and  modest  countenance,  displayed 
considerable  historical  knowledge  of  the  custf-m, 
without  one  touch  of  bashfulness."* 

Thus  much  for  Wales,  where  the  custom  seems 
to  have  been  entirely  confined  to  the  lower 
classes  of  society,  and  where  we  have  reason  to 
think  it  still  prevails  to  some  extent  to  this  day.f 


*"0n  his  way  to  Ireland  he  passed  through  Wales,  and 
gives  us  a  slight  sketch  of  the  character  of  that  people  and 
country.  It  must  uffai'd  no  small  gratification  to  a  New  England 
man  to  learn  tJiat  the  practice  of  bundling  is  not  peculiar  to  us, 
but  that  this  pleasing  though  dangerous  art  was  probably  imported 
from  abroad." — A  review  of  Ihe  Stranger  in  Ireland,  in  Con- 
necticut Gourant  for  November  19th,  1806. 

f  In  this  connection  we  may  give  the  following  extract 
ivova.  Ancient  Lmws  and  Institutes  of  Wales,  etc.,  etc.,  printed  by 
command  of  his  late  Majesty  King  William  IV,  under  the 
direction  of  the  commissioners  on  the  Public  Records  of  the 
Kingdom.  MDCCCXLI.  Folio.  From  page  369. —  The 
Gwentian*  Code. 

"  A  woman  of  full  age  who  goes  with  a  man  clandestinely, 
.ind  taken  by  him  to  bush,  or  brake,  or  house,  and  after  con- 
nection deserted ;  upon-  complaint  made  by  her  to  her  kindred, 
and  to  the  courts,  is  to  Receive,  for  her  chastity,  a  bull  of 
three  winters,  having  its  tail  well  shaven  and  greased  and 
then  thrust  through  the  door-elate ;  and  then  let  the  woman 
go  into  the  house,  the  bull  being  outside,  and  let  her  plant 

*  Gwent,  the  appellation  of  the  district  in  Wales  inhabited  by  the  Silaret, 
comprised  the  diocese  of  Laridav. 


Bundling.  o5 

The  same  author  whom  we  last  quoted  also 
speaks  of  a  "  courtship  similar  to  bundling^  car- 
ried on  in  the  islands  of  Vlie  and  Wieringen, 

In  Holland, 

Under  the  name  of  qiieesting.*  At  night  the 
lover  has  access  to  his  mistress  after  she  is  in 
bed ;  and,  upon  an  application  to  be  admitted 
upon  the  bed,  which  is  of  course  granted,  he 
raises  the  quilt,  or  rug,  and  in  this  state  queests, 
or  enjoys  a  harmless  chit-chat  with  her,  and  then 


her  foot  on  the  threshold,  and  let  her  take  his  tail  in  her  hand, 
and  let  a  man  come  on  each  side  of  the  bull ;  and  if  slie  can 
hold  the  bull,  let  her  take  it  for  her  wynet-werth\  and  her 
chastity ;  and,  if  not,  let  her  take  what  grease  may  adhere  to 
her  hands." 

*  A  good  honest  word,  which  although  not  exactly  English, 
is  at  least  first  cousin  to  our  quest,  and  quiz^  etc. 

"Worcester  gives  the  following:  "f  Quese,  v.  a.,  to  search 
after.  Milton."  [obsolete  e  long,  s  like  z.]  QuSst,  v.  n.,  to  join 
search.  B.  Jonson.    fQu6ster,  n.,|^ seeker.  lioire. 

Is  it  not  allowable  to  derive  from  one  of  these  words 
Quesing,  or  Questing,  pronounced  Qweesting,  and  from  the 
other  QuSsting  [h  short]  ?  So  that  he  who  went  queesting  was 
Bimply  6'iir<'lnvg  after  a  wife,  understood. 

tThle  word  menns  face  shame  or  face  worth. 


36  Bundling. 

retires.  This  custom  meets  with  the  perfect 
sanction  of  the  most  circumspect  parents,  and 
the  freedom  is  seldom  abused.  The  author 
traces  its  origin  to  the  parsimony  of  the  people, 
whose  economy  considers  fire  and  candles  as 
superfluous  luxuries  in  the  long  winter  evenings." 
The  Hon.  Henry  C.  Murphy  of  Brooklyn, 
N.  Y.,  late  United  States  minister  at  the  Hague, 
has  furnished  us  with  the  following  note  in  rela- 
tion to  this  Nederduitsche  custom :  "  As  to 
its  being  a  Dutch  custom,  it  was  so  to  a  limited 
extent  in  Holland  in  former  times,  and  may  yet 
be,  though  I  did  not  hear  of  it  when  I  was  there. 
Sewell  gives  the  word  queesten^  or  kioeesten,  in 
his  dictionary,  printed  over  a  century  ago.  The 
word  is  defined  in  the  dictionary  of  Wieland,  the 
principal  lexicograoher  in  that  country,  as  fol- 
lows: *■  Kweesten,  Upon  the  islands  of  Texel 
and  Vlieland  *  they  use  this  word  for  a  singular 
custom  of  wooing,    by  which  the  doors  and 


♦These  are  two  very  small  islands  at  the  opening  of  the 
Zuider  zee. 


Bundling.  37 

\vindow8  are  left  opeu,  and  the  lover,  lying  or 
sitting  outside  the  covering,  woos  the  girl  who  is 
underneath.*  Sewell  confines  the  custom  to  cer- 
tain islands  or  lands  near  the  sea." 

Love  and  Courtship  in  the  14th  Century. 

In  feudal  times,  iu  the  last  part  of  the  four- 
teenth century,  it  became  the  practice  for  the 
vassals,  or  feudatories,  to  send  their  sons  to  be 
educated  in  the  family  of  the  suzerain,  while  the 
daughters  were  similarly  placed  with  the  lady  of 
the  castle.  These  formed  a  very  important  part 
of  the  household,  and  were  of  gentle  blood, 
claiming  the  honorary  title  of  chambriSres  or 
chamber-maidens.  The  demoiselles  of  this  pe- 
riod were  very  susceptible  to  the  passion  of  love, 
which  was  the  ruling  spirit  of  the  inmates  of  the 
castle.  Feudal  society  was,  in  comparison  to 
the  previous  times,  polished  and  even  brilliant, 
but  it  was  not,  under  the  surface,  pure.  Many 
good  maxims  were  taught,  but  they  were  not  all 
practiced.  "  There  was  an  extreme  intimacy 
4 


38  Bundling. 

between  tlie  tvvo  sexes,  who  commonly  visited 
each  other  in  their  chambers  or  bedrooms. 
Thus  in  the  poem  of  Guatier  d'Aiipias,  the  hero 
is  represented  as  visiting  in  her  chamber  the 
demoiselle  of  whom  he  is  enamored.  I^umer- 
ous  similar  examples  might  be  quoted.  At  times, 
one  of  the  parties  is  described  as  being  actually 
in  bed,  as  is  the  case  in  the  romance  of  Blonde  of 
Oxford,  where  Blonde  visits  Jehan  in  his  chamber 
when  he  is  in  bed,  and  stays  all  night  with  him, 
in  perfect  innocence  as  we  are  told  in  the  ro- 
mance. "We  must  remember  that  it  was  the 
custom  in  those  times  for  both  sexes  to  go  to  bed 
perfectly  naked."* 

In  Switzerland, 

According  to  an  English  observer,  f  analogous 
modes  of  courtship  still  exist.     In  speaking  of 


*  From  The  Student  and  Intelkctual  Obs&rmr,  London,  No- 
vember number,  1868,  p.  310,  in  article  by  Thomas  Wright, 
F.S.A.  Chapter  vii —  Womankind  in  all  Ages  of  Western 
Europe,  etc. 

f  Cottages  of  the  Alps  (London,  1860),  pages  77,  91, 132. 


Bundling.  39 

the  canton  Untenoald  he  says  :  "  In  the  story  of 
the  destruction  of  the  castles,  we  read  that  the 
surprise  was  effected  by  a  young  girl  admitting 
her  lover  to  her  room  by  a  ladder,  and  an  English 
guide-book  remarks,  that  this  is  still  the  fashion 
of  receiving  lovers  in  Switzerland.  Reference 
is  had  to  the  manner  of  wooing,  which  in  some 
cantons  is  called  lichtgetrm,  in  others  dorfen  and 
stiihetegetrm,  and  answers  to  the  old-fashioned 
going-a-courting  in  England.  The  customs  con- 
nected with  it  vary  in  different  cantons,  but  exist 
in  some  form  in  all  except  two  or  three. 

In  the  canton  Lueerne^  the  kUigang  is  the  uni- 
versal mode  of  wooing;  the  lover  visiting  his 
betrothed  in  the  evening,  to  be  pelted  on  the  way 
by  all  mischievous  urchins ;  or  if  he  is  seated 
quietly  with  her  by  the  winter  fire,  they  are  sure 
to  be  serenaded  by  all  manner  ofm^vo/cesunder  the 
window,  which  are  continued  till  he  issues  forth, 
perhaps  at  dawn  in  the  morning ;  and  however 
long  may  be  a  courtship,  these  cater-waulings  are 
the   invariable   attendants,    and   not    the   most 


40  Bundling. 

lameiiiable  consequences  of  these  nightly  visits, 
recognized,  however,  as  entirely  respectable  and 
conventional  in  every  canton." 

And  again  in  the  canton  Vaud,  he  says,  "  the 
kiltgang,  or  nightly  wooings,  are  the  universal 
custom  with  the  universal  consequences,  but  in 
general  the  wife  is  treated  with  marked  respect, 
in  made  keeper  of  the  treasury,  and  consulted  aa 
the  oracle  of  the  family." 

Among  the  amatory  customs  of  various 

Savage  Nations 

and  tribes,  there  are  certain  which  somewhat 
resemble  bundling^  except  in  the  greater  degree 
of  freedom  allowed  —  a  freedom  which,  in  the 
eyes  of  civilized  nations,  is  absolute  immorality. 
Of  this  description  is  the  manner  of  wooing 
described  by  La  Hontan  as  prevalent  among  the 
Indians  of  IS^orth  America.* 


*  New  Voyarje  to  North  America,  giving  a  fuU  Account  of  th« 
Customs,  Commerce,  Religion  and  Strange  Opinions  of  the  Savages 
of  tTiat  Country,  etc.,  etc.     Written  by  tlie  Baron  Lahontan, 


Bundling.  4.1 

Yet,  in  many  of  these  instances,  if  we  were 
to  carefully  examine  the  social  system  and  cus- 
toms of  our  savage  friends,  and  were  willing' to 
judge  them  rather  by  the  results  of  our  own  ob- 
servation, than  by  our  preconceived  opinions,  we 
should  probably  find  that  the  absolute  'practical 
morality  of  these  untutored  natives,  was  quite  equal, 
if  aot  superior,  to  that  of  the  educated  and 
civilized  whites.* 


Lord  Lieuteuaut  of  the  French  Colony  at  Placentia,  in  New- 
foundland, now  in  England.     London,  1703. 

In  describing  the  amatory  customs  of  the  Indians  of  this 
country,  the  author  says  (Vol.  II,  p.  37) : 

"  You  must  know  further,  that  Two  Hours  after  Sun-set 
the  Old  Supperannuated  Persons,  or  Slaves  (who  never  lie  in 
their  Masters'  Huts)  take  care  to  cover  up  the  Fire  before  they 
go.  'Tis  then  that  the  Young  Savage  comes  well  wrapt  up 
to  his  Mistress's  Hut,  and  lights  a  sort  of  a  Match  at  the 
Fire  ;  after  which  he  opens  the  Door  of  his  Mistress's  Apart- 
ment and  makes  up  to  her  bed :  If  she  blows  out  the  light 
he  lies  down  by  her ;  but  if  she  pulls  her  Covering  over  her 
Face,  he  retires ;  that  being  a  Sign  that  she  will  not  receive 
him." 

*  Verily,  Peters's  sarcasm  savors  as  much  of  truth  as  lunnor 
when,  speaking  of  bundling,  he  says :  "  The  Indians  who  had 
this  method  of  courtship  among  them  in  1634,  are  the  most 
chaste  set  of  people  in  the  world.  Concubinage  and  fornica- 
tion are  vices  none  of  them  are  addicted  to,  except  such  as 


42  Bundling. 

Among  these  customs  tie  amour,  liowever,  to 
which  we  have  alluded  as  existing  among  different 
savage  tribes,  there  are  none  which  bear  so  per- 
fect a  resemblance  to  bundling,  as  that  described 
by  Masson  in  his  Journeys  in  Central  Asia,  Be- 
lochistan,  Afghanistan,  etc.  (Ill,  287.)    He  says : 

"  Many  of  the  Afghan  tribes  have  a  custom 
of  wooing  similar  to  what  in  "Wales  is  known  as 
bundling-up,  and  which  they  term  namzat  hezL 
The  lover  presents  himself  at  the  house  of  his 
betrothed  with  a  suitable  gift,  and  in  return  is 
allowed  to  pass  the  night  with  her,  on  the  under- 
standing that  innocent  endearments  are  not  to  be 
exceeded." 

Spencer  St.  John  tells  us,  in  speaking  of  the 
piratical  and  ferocious  Sea  Dayaks  of  Bornec', 
that   "besides   the   ordinary  attention  which  a 


forsake  the  laws  of  Hobbamockon  and  turn  Christians.  The 
savat/;cs  have  taken,  many  female  prisoners,  carried  them  back 
three  hundi-ed  miles  into  their  country,  and  kept  them  several 
years,  and  yet  not  a  single  instance  of  their  violating  the  laws 
of  chastity  has  ever  been  known.  This  cannot  be  said  of  the 
French,  or  of  the  English,  whenever  Indian  or  other  women 
have  fallen  into  their  hands." 


Bundling.  43 

young  man  is  able  to  pay  to  the  girl  he  desires  to 
make  his  wife  —  as  helping  her  in  her  farm  work, 
and  in  carrying  home  her  load  of  vegetables  oi 
wood,  as  well  as  in  making  her  little  presents,  as 
a  ring  or  some  brass  chain-work  with  which  the 
women  adorn  their  waists,  or  even  a  petticoat — 
there  is  a  very  peculiar  testimony  of  regard 
which  is  worthy  of  note.  About  nine  or  ten  at 
night,  when  the  family  is  supposed  to  be  fast 
asleep  within  the  musquito  curtains  in  the  pri- 
vate apartments,  the  young  man  quietly  slips 
back  the  bolt  by  which  the  door  is  fastened  on 
the  inside,  and  enters  the  room  on  tiptoe.  On 
hearing  who  it  is,  she  rises  at  once,  and  they  sit 
conversing  together  and  making  arrangements  for 
the  future,  in  the  dark,  over  a  plentiful  supply  of 
sirih-leaf  and  baUe-nut,  which  it  is  the  gentle- 
man's duty  to  provide,  for  his  suit  is  in  a  fair  way 
to  prosper ;  but  if,  on  the  other  hand,  she  rises 
and  says,  '  be  good  enough  to  blow  up  the  fire,' 
or  '  light  the  lamp '  (a  bamboo  filled  with  resin), 
then  his  hopes  are  at  an  end,  as  that  is  the  usual 


44  Bundling. 

form  of  dismissal.  Of  course,  if  this  kind  of 
nocturnal  visit  is  frequently  repeated,  the  parents 
do  not  fail  to  discover  it,  although  it  is  a  point  of 
honor  among  them  to  take  no  notice  of  their 
visitor;  and,  if  they  approve  of  him,  matters 
then  take  their  course,  but  if  not,  they  use  their 
influence  with  their  daughter  to  ensure  the  utter- 
ance of  the  fatal  '  please  blow  up  the  fire.' " 

And  now,  having  discussed  the  custom  of 
bundling  as  it  formerly  existed  in  Great  Britain, 
and  having  proved  its  identity  with  the  queesiing 
of  Hollar  i.  and  the  namzat  bezS  of  Central 
Asia,  we  propose  to  follow  our  investigations  to 
the  continent  of  America,  and  to  trace,  if  we 
can,  its  origin  and  progress  in  the 

United  States  of  America, 

in  doing  which,  it  is  quite  likely  that,  we  follow 
the  identical  line  of  travel  and  colonization  — 
viz:  from  Old  to  New  England,  and  from  Ne- 
therlands (the  father-land)  to  New  Netherlands  — 


Bundling.  45 

by  which  the  custom  of  bundling  was  really 
transplanted  to  these  western  shores.  For, 
although  the  grave  and  (sometimes)  veracious 
historian  of  l!^"ew  York,  Diedrich  Knickerbocker, 
hath  endeavored  to  fasten  upon  the  Connecticut 
settlers  the  odium  of  having  introduced  the 
custom  into  New  Netherland,*  to  the  great 
offense  of  all  properly  disposed  people;  yet  wc 
may  reasonably  doubt  whether  the  young  myn- 
heers and  frauleins  of  New  Amsterdam,  in  that 
day,  were  any  more  innocent  of  this  lover's 
pastime,  than  their  vivacious  Connecticut  neigh- 
bors.    Indeed,  can  it  be  for  one  moment  sup- 


*  "  Great  jealousy  did  they  likewise  stir  up  by  their  inter- 
meddling and  successes  among  the  divine  sex ;  for  being  a 
race  of  brisk,  likely,  pleasant  tongued  varlets,  they  soon  se- 
duced the  light  affections  of  the  simple  lasses  from  their 
ponderous  Dutch  gallants.  Among  other  hideous  customs, 
they  attcmi)ted  to  introduce  among  theni'that  of  bundling, 
■which  the  Dutch  lasses  of  the  Nederlandts,  with  that  eager 
passion  for  novelty  and  foreign  fashions  natural  to  their  sex, 
seemed  verj'  well  inclined  to  follow,  but  that  their  mothers, 
being  more  experienced  in  the  world,  and  better  acquainted 
with  men  and  things,  strenuously  discountenanced  all  such 
outlandish  innovations." 


46  Bundling. 

posed  that  the  good  Hollanders — a  most  un- 
changing and  conservative  race  —  should  have 
been  so  far  false  to  the  traditions  of  their  fathers, 
and  the  honor  of  the  fatherland,  as  to  leave 
behind  them,  when  they  crossed  the  seas,  the 
good  old  custom  of  queesting,  with  its  time- 
honored  associations  and  delights?  Or  can  it  be 
imagined  that  those  astute  lawgivers  and  political 
economists,  the  early  governors  and  burgo- 
masters, were  so  blind  to  the  necessities  and 
interests  of  a  new  and  sparsely  populated 
country,  as  to  forbid  bundling  within  their  bor- 
ders ?  Indeed,  it  would  be  but  a  sorry  compliment 
to  the  wisdom  of  that  sagacious  and  far-sighted 
body  of  merchants  comprised  in  the  High  and 
Mighty  West  India  Company,  to  believe  that 
they  were  unwilling  to  introduce  under  their 
benign  auspices,  a  custom  so  intimately  con- 
nected with  own  national  social  habits,  and  so 
promising  to  the  prospective  interests  and  enlarge- 
ment of  their  new  plantations ^  as  this.  And,  truly, 
Diedi-ich  himself,  doth,  in  another  part  of  his 


Bundling.  47 

book,  inadvertently  betray  the  fact  tbat  bundling 
was  by  no  means  a  purely  Yankee  trick,  for  he 
speaks  of  the  redoubtable  Anthony  Yan  Corlaer — 
purest  of  Dutchmen  —  as  "  passing  through 
Hartford,  and  Pyquag,  and  Middletown,  and  all 
the  other  border  towns,  twanging  his  trumpet  like 
a  very  devil,  so  that  the  sweet  valleys  and  banks 
of  the  Connecticut  resounded  with  the  warlike 
melody,  and  stopping  occasionally  to  eat  pumpkin 
pies,  dance  at  country  frolics,  and  bundle  with  the 
beauteous  lasses  of  those  parts,  whom  he  rejoiced 
exceedingly  with  his  soul-stirring  instrument." 
"WTiich  passage,  while  it  proves  that  the  practice 
of  bundling  prevailed  in  Connecticut,  proves 
equally  well  that  Anthony  the  trumpeter  was  by 
no  means  inexperienced  in  its  delights,  nor  un- 
willing to  enjoy  its  comforts,  whether  under  the 
name  of  bundling  or  queesiing. 

Indeed,  we  do  most  truly  believe  that  the  cun- 
ning Knickerbocker,  in  his  desire  to  vindicate,  as 
he  thought,  the  character  of  his  race  against  the 
accusation  of  immorality,  hath  by  his  denial  not 


48  Bundling. 

only  committed  a  grievous  sin  against  "  the  truth 
of  history,"  but  hath  greatly  added  thereto,  by 
attempting  to  foist  off  the  opprobrium  of  the 
same  on  to  the  shoulders  of  the  Connecticut 
folks.  But  history  will  not  remain  forever  falsi- 
fied, and  the  day  has  at  length  arrived  when 
every  historical  tub  must  "  stand  on  its  own  bot- 
tom," and  the  world  will  henceforth  know  that 
the  Kew  ITetherlanders  did  not  take  bundling  by 
inoculation  from  the  Yankees,  but  that  they 
brought  it  with  them  to  the  New  World,  as  an 
ancestral  heirloom. 

This  point  being  thus  satisfactorily  settled,  to  the 
honor  of  the  Dutchman,  and  the  extreme  satis- 
faction of  all  future  historians,  we  next  proceed 
to  investigate  the  bundling  prevalent  in 

The  New  England  States, 

Where,  as  we  have  alread}^  shown,  it  was,  as 
with  the  Dutchmen,  an  inherited  custom.  Its 
comparatively  innocent  and  harmless  character 
has,  however,  been  fearfully  distorted  and  ma- 


Bundling.  49 

ligued  bv  irresponsible  satirists,  and  prejudiced 
historians.  Take,  for  example,  the  following 
passage  from  Knickerbocker's  History  of  New 
York*  wherein  he  pretends  to  describe  "the 
curious  device  among  these  sturdy  barbarians 
[the  Connecticut  colonists],  to  keep  up  a  har- 
mony of  interests,  and  promote  population. 
*  *  *  They  multiplied  to  a  degree  which 
would  be  incredible  to  any  man  unacquainted 
with  the  marvellous  fecundity  of  this  growing 
country.  This  amazing  increase  may,  indeed, 
be  partly  ascribed  to  a  singular  custom  prevalent 
among  them,  commonly  known  by  the  name  of 
bundlivg — a  superstitious  rite  observed  by  the 
young  people  of  both  sexes,  with  which  they 
usually  terminated  their  festivities,  and  which 
was  kept  up  with  religious  strictness  by  the  more 
bigoted  and  vulgar  part  of  the  community.  This 
ceremony  was  likewise,  in  those  primitive  times, 
considered  as  an   indispensable  preliminary   to 


*By  Washington  Irving,  p.  211.    4th  Am.  edition. 

5 


50  Bundling. 

matrimony ;  their  courtships  commencing  where 
ours  usually  finish,  hy  which  means  they  acquired, 
that  intimate  acquaintance  with  each  other's  good 
qualities  before  marriage,  which  has  been  pro- 
nounced by  philosophers  the  sure  basis  of  a 
happy  union.  Thus  early  did  this  cunning  and 
ingenious  people  display  a  shrewdness  at  making 
a  bargain,  which  has  ever  since  distinguished 
them,  and  a  strict  adherence  to  the  good  old 
vulgar  maxim  about '  buying  a  pig  in  a  poke.' 

"  To  this  sagacious  custom,  therefore,  do  I 
chiefly  attribute  the  unparalleled  increase  of  the 
Yanokie  or  Yankee  tribe ;  for  it  is  a  certain  fact, 
well  authenticated  by  court,  records  and  parish 
registers,  that  wherever  the  practice  of  bundling 
prevailed,  there  was  an  amazing  number  of 
sturdy  brats  annually  born  unto  the  state,  with- 
out the  license  of  the  law,  or  the  benefit  of 
clergy.  Neither  di  d  the  irregularity  of  their  bi  rth 
operate  in  the  least  to  their  disparagement.  On 
the  contrary,  they  grew  up  a  long-sided,  raw- 
boned,  hardy  race  of  whoreson  whalers,  wood 


BU-NDLINCJ.  51 

cutters,  fishermen,  and  peddlers ;  and  strapping 
corn-fed  wenches,  who  by  their  united  efforts 
tended  marvellously  towards  populating  those 
notable  tracts  of  country  called  ^"antucket, 
Piscataway,  and  Cape  Cod." 

Hear,  also,  that  learned,  but  audacious  and 
unscrupulous  divine,  the  Rev.  Samuel  Peters, 
who  thus  discourseth  at  length  upon  the  custom 
of  bundling  in  Connecticut,  and  other  parts  of 
Kew  England.  After  admitting  that  "the 
women  of  Connecticut  are  strictly  virtuous,  and 
to  be  compared  to  the  prude  rather  than  the 
European  polite  lady,"  he  says : 

"Notwithstanding  the  modesty  of  the  females 
is  such  that  it  would  be  accounted  the  greatest 
rudeness  for  a  gentleman  to  speak  before  a  lady 
of  a  garter,  knee,  or  leg,  yet  it  is  thought  but  a 
piece  of  civility  to  ask  her  to  bundle;  a  custom 
as  old  as  the  first  settlement  in  1634.  It  is  cer- 
tainly innocent,  virtuous  and  prudent,  or  tlie 
puritans  would  not  have  permitted  it  to  prevail 
among  their  offspring,  for  whom  in  general  they 


52  Bundling. 

would  suffer  crucifixion.  Childreu  brought  up 
with  the  chastest  ideas,  with  so  much  religion  as 
to  believe  that  the  omniscient  God  sees  them  in 
the  dark,  and  that  angels  guard  them  when  ab- 
sent from  their  parents,  will  not,  nay,  cannot,  act 
a  wicked  thing.  People  who  are  influenced  more 
by  lust,  than  a  serious  faith  in  God,  ^^'ho  is  too 
pure  to  behold  iniquity  with  approbation,  ought 
never  to  bundle.  If  any  man,  thus  a  stranger  to 
the  love  of  virtue,  of  God,  and  the  Christian 
religion,  should  bundle  with  a  young  lady  in  New 
England,  and  behave  himself  unseemly  towards 
her,  he  must  first  melt  her  into  passion,  and  ex- 
pel heaven,  death,  and  hell,  from  her  mind,  or 
he  will  undergo  the  chastisement  of  negroes 
turned  mad — if  he  escape  with  life,  it  will  be 
owing  to  the  parents  flj'ing  from  their  bed  to 
protect  him.  The  Indians,  who  had  this  method 
of  courtship  when  the  English  arrived  among 
them  in  1634,  are  the  most  chaste  set  of  people 
in  the  world.  Concubinage  and  fornication  are 
vices  none  of  them  are  addicted  to,  except  such 


Bundling.  58 

as  forsake  the  laws  of  Hobbamockow  and  turn 
Christians.  The  savages  have  taken  many  fe- 
male prisoners,  carried  them  back  three  hundred 
miles  into  their  country,  and  kept  them  several 
years,  and  yet  not  a  single  instance  of  their  vio- 
lating the  laws  of  chastity  has  ever  been  known. 
This  cannot  l^e  said  of  the  French,  or  of  the 
English,  whenever  Indian  or  other  women  have 
fallen  into  their  hands.  I  am  no  advocate  for 
temptation  ;  yet  must  say,  that  bundling  has  pre- 
vailed 160  years  in  New  England,  and,  I  verily 
believe,  Avith  ten  times  more  chastity  than  the 
sitting  on  a  sofa.  I  had  daughters,  and  speak 
from  near  forty  years'  experience.  Bundling 
takes  place  only  in  cold  seasons  of  the  year — 
the  sofa  in  summer  is  more  dangerous  than 
the  bed  in  Avinter.  About  the  year  1756,  Bos- 
ton, Salem,  Newport,  and  New  York,  resolving 
to  be  more  polite  than  their  ancestors,  forbade 
their  daughters  bundling  on  the  bed  with  any 
young  men  whatever,  and  introduced  a  sofa  to 
render  courtship  more  palatable  and  Turkish. 


54  Bundling. 

whatever  it  was  owing  to,  whether  to  the  sofa, 
or  any  uncommon  excess  of  the  feu  d'esprit,  there 
went  abroad  a  report  that  this  raffiimge  produced 
more  natural  consequences  then  all  the  bundling 
among  the  boors  with  their  rurales  pcdantes, 
through  every  village  in  New  England  besides/ 
"  In  1776,  a  clergyman  from  one  of  the  polite 
towns,  went  into  the  country,  and  preached 
against  the  unchristian  custom  of  young  men  and 
maidens  lying  together  on  a  bed.  He  was  no 
sooner  out  of  the  church,  then  attacked  by  a 
shoal  of  good  old  women,  with,  'Sir,  do  you 
think  we  and  our  daughters  are  naughty,  because 
we  allow  bundling  ? '  *  You  lead  yourselves  into 
temptation  by  it'  They  all  replied  at  once, 
*  Sir,  have  you  been  told  thus,  or  has  experience 
taught  it  you  ? '  The  Levite  began  to  lift  up  his 
eyes,  and  to  consider  of  his  situation,  and  bow- 
ing, said,  '  I  have  been  told  so.'  The  ladies,  una 
voce  J  bawled  out,  'Your  informants,  sir,  we  con- 
clude, are  those  city  ladies  who  prefer  a  sofa  to  a 
bed:  we   advise  you  to  alter  your  sermon,  by 


Bundling.  65 

substituting  the  word  sofa  for  bundling,  and  jn 
your  return  home  preach  it  to  them,  for  ex- 
perience has  told  us  that  city  folks  send  more 
children  into  the  country  without  fathers  or 
mothers  to  own  them,  than  are  born  among  us; 
therefore,  you  see,  a  sofa  is  more  dangerous  than 
a  bed.'  The  poor  priest,  seemingly  convinced 
of  his  blunder,  exclaimed,  '  Nee  viiia  nostra,  nee 
remedia  pati  possumus,'  hoping  thereby  to  get  rid 
of  his  guests  ;  but  an  old  matron  pulled  off  her 
spectacles,  and,  looking  the  priest  in  the  face  like 
a  Roman  heroine,  said,  ^Noli  puiare  me  hcec 
auribus  iuis  dare.'  Others  cried  out  to  the  priest 
to  explain  his  Latin.  '  The  English,'  said  he, 
*is  this:  Wo  is  me  that  I  sojourn  in  Meseck,  and 
dwell  in  the  tents  of  Kedar ! '  One  pertly  re- 
torted,- '  Gladii  decussati  sunt  gemina  presbgten 
clavis.'  The  priest  confessed  his  error,  begged 
pardon,  and  promised  never  more  to  preach 
against  bundling,  or  to  think  amiss  of  the  cus- 
tom ;  the  ladies  generously  forgave  him,  and 
went  away. 


56  Bundling. 

"  It  may  seem  very  strange  to  find  this  custom 
of  bundling  in  bed  attended  with  so  much  inno- 
cence in  New  England,  while  in  Europe  it  is 
thought  not  safe  or  scarcely  decent  to  jiermit  a 
young  man  and  maid  to  be  together  in  private 
anywhere.  But  in  this  quarter  of  the  old  world 
the  viciousness  of  the  one,  and  the  simplicity  of 
the  other,  are  the  result  merely  of  education  and 
habit.  It  seems  to  be  a  part  of  heroism,  among 
the  pohshed  nations  of  it,  to  sacrifice  the  virtu- 
ous fair  one,  whenever  an  opportunity  offers,  and 
thence  it  is  concluded  that  the  same  principles 
actuate  those  of  the  new  world.  It  is  egregi- 
ously  absurd  to  judge  of  all  countries  by  one. 
In  Spain,  Portugal  and  Italy,  jealousy  reigns;  in 
France,  England,  and  Holland,  suspicion;  in  the 
"West  and  East  Indies,  lust;  in  JTew  England, 
superstition.  These  four  blind  deities  govern 
Jews,  Turks,  Christians,  infidels,  and  heathen. 
Superstition  is  the  most  amiable.  She  sees  no 
vice  with  approbation  but  persecution,  and  self- 
preservation  is  the  cause  of  her  seeing  that.    My 


Bundling.  57 

insular  readers  will,  I  hope,  believe  me,  when  I 
tell  them  that  I  have  seen,  in  the  West  Indies, 
naked  bojs  and  girls,  some  fifteen  or  sixteen 
years  of  age,  waiting  at  table  and  at  tea,  even 
when  twenty  or  thirty  virtuous  English  ladies 
were  in  the  room;  who  were  under  no  more 
embarrassment  at  such  an  awful  sight  in  the  eyes 
of  English  people  that  have  not  traveled  abroad, 
than  they  would  have  been  at  the  sight  of  so 
many  servants  in  livery.  Shall  we  censure  the 
ladies  of  the  West  Indies  as  vicious  above  all 
their  sex,  on  account  of  this  local  custom?  By 
no  means;  for  long  experience  has  taught  the 
world  that  the  West  Indian  white  ladies  are 
virtuous  prudes.  Wliere  superstition  reigns, 
fanaticism  vn\\  be  minister  of  state ;  and  che 
people,  under  the  taxation  of  zeal,  w\\\  shun 
what  is  commonly  called  vice,  with  ten  timen 
more  care  than  the  polite  and  civilized  Christians, 
who  know  what  is  right  and  what  is  wrong  from 
reason  and  revelation.  Happy  would  it  be  for 
the  world,  if  reason  and  revelation  were  suffered 


58  Bundling. 

to  coutrol  the  mind  and  passions  of  the  great  and 
wise  men  of  the  earth,  as  superstition  does  that 
of  the  simple  and  less  polished !  "When  America 
shall  erect  societies  for  the  promotion  of  chastity 
in  Europe,  in  return  for  the  establishment  of 
European  arts  in  the  American  capitals,  then 
Europe  will  discover  that  there  is  more  Christian 
philosophy  in  American  bundling  than  can  be 
found  in  the  customs  of  nations  more  polite, 

"I  should  not  have  said  so  much  about  bund- 
ling, had  not  a  learned  divine*  of  the  English 
church  published  his  travels  through  some  parts 
of  America,  wherein  this  remarkable  custom  is  re- 
presented in  an  unfavorable  light,  and  as  prevail- 
ing among  the  lower  class  of  people.  The  truth 
is,  the  custom  prevails  among  all  classes,  to  the 
great  honor  of  the  country,  its  religion,  and 
ladies.  The  virtuous  may  be  tempted;  but  the 
tempter  is  despised.     "Why  it  should  be  thought 


*  Dr.  Andrew  Bumaby.  Travels  through  the  Middle  Settle- 
ments in  North  America,  in  the  years  1759  and  '  60.  London, 
1775. 


Bundling.  59 

incredible  for  a  young  man  and  young  woman 
innocently  and  virtuously  to  lie  down  together  in 
a  bed  with  a  great  part  of  their  clothes  on,  I 
cannot  conceive.  Human  passions  may  be  alike 
in  every  region;  but  religion,  diversified  as  it  is, 
operates  differently  in  different  countries.  Upon 
the  whole,  had  I  daughters  now,  I  would  venture 
to  let  them  bundle  on  the  bed,  or  even  on  the 
sofa,  after  a  proper  education,  sooner  than  adopt 
the  Spanish  mode  of  forcing  young  people  to 
prattle  only  before  the  lady's  mother  the  chitchat 
of  artless  lovers.  Could  the  four  quarters  of  the 
world  produce  a  more  chaste,  exemplary  and 
beautiful  company  of  wives  and  daughters  than 
are  in  Connecticut,  I  should  not  have  remaining 
one  favorable  sentiment  for  the  province.  But 
the  soil,  the  rivers,  the  ponds,  the  ten  thousand 
landscapes,  together  with  the  virtuous  and  lovely 
women  which  now  adorn  the  ancient  kingdoms 
of  Connecticote,  Sassacus,  and  Quinnipiog, 
would  tempt  me  into  the  highest  wonder  and  ad- 
miration of  them,  could  they  once  be  freed  of 


60  Bundling. 

the  skuuk,  the  moping-owl,  rattlesnake  and  fa- 
natic Christian." 

Or,  to  take  another  example  of  the  abuse 
heaped  by  our  English  cousins  upon  this  so-called 
"  American  custom  of  bundling."  We  extract 
the  following  from  an  article  entitled  British 
Abuse  of  American  Manners^  published  in  1815.* 
It  seems  that  it  had  long  been  a  custom  in  the 
Westminster  school,  in  the  city  of  London,  for 
the  senior  students,  who  were  about  to  leave  that 
seminary  for  the  university,  at  the  age  of  sixteen 
to  eighteen,  to  have  an  annual  dramatic  perform- 
ance, which  was  generally  a  play  of  Terence.f 
To  this,  as  annually  performed,  there  was  usually 
a  Latin  prologue,  and  also  an  epilogue  composed 
for  the  occasion ;  and  this  epilogue  turned,  for 
the  most  part,  on  the  manners  of  the  day  that 


*  The  Portfolio  (Philadelphia,  May  1816),  p.  397. 

f  Terence^s  Plays  were  preferred  to  those  of  Plautus,  for 
this  purpose,  inasmuch  as  the  hitter  were  more  obscure,  and 
abounded  in  o])soletisms,  and  therefore  Terence  was  preferred 

in  Enft-land  as  the  text-book  for  schools. 


Bundling.  G1 

would  bear  the  gentle  correction  of  good  humored 
satire,  in  elegant  Latinity.  In  the  epilogue  pre- 
sented at  one  of  these  exhibitions,  about  1815, 
in  connection  with  the  performance  of  Terence's 
Phomiio,  the  following  balderdash  (with  much 
else,  as  applied  to  American  life  and  manners) 
was  introduced  and  spoken  by  these  ingenuous 
and  virtuous  British  youth,  before  a  large  and 
enUghtened  audience : 

"  Nee  morum  dicere  promtum  est, 
Sit  ratio  simplex,  sitne  venusta  magis, 
^thiopissa  palam  mensfe  formulatur  herili 
In  purls  naturalibus,  ut  loquimur. 
Vir  braccis  se  bellus  amat  nudare  decenter, 
Strenuus  ut  choreas  ex-que-peditus  agat. 
Quid  quod  ibi ;  quod  congere  ipsis  conque  moveri 
Dicitur,  incolumi  nempe  pudicitit,  [unum. 

Sponte  suS,  sine  fraude,  torum  sese  audet  in 
Condere  cum  casto  casta  puelle  viro  ?  [orum. 
Quid  uoctes  ccenaque  Dcum?  quid  amoena  pi- 
Concilia?" 

6 


62  Bundling. 

Which  being  translated  is  as  follows : 
"  Nor  is  it  easy  to  say  whether  the  tenor  of 
their  manners  is  more  to  be  admired  for  sim- 
plicity or  elegance ;  a  negro  wench,  as  we  are 
told,  will  wait  on  her  master  at  table  in  native 
nudity;  and  a  beau  will  strip  himself  to  the 
Avaist,  that  he  may  dance  unincumbered,  and 
witli  more  agility.  There,  too,  we  heai-  of  the 
practice  of  bundling  without  any  inlVaction  of 
female  modesty;  and  the  chaste  maiden,  without 
any  deception,  but  with  right  good  will,  ventures 
to  share  the  bed  with  her  chaste  swain!  Oh, 
what  nights  and  banquets,  worthy  of  the  gods ! 
"What  delightful  customs  among  these  pious 
people?" 

But  this  spirit  of  misrepresentation  and  ridi- 
cule, so  glaringly  apparent  in  the  foregoing  ex- 
tracts, and  which  has  so  universally  characterized 
all  those  British  travelers  and  authors  who  have 
attempted  to  describe  our  social  habits  and  man- 
ners, is  fitly  rebuked,  even  as  long  ago  as  1815, 
by  an  anonymous  writer,   whose  trenchant  pen 


Bundling.  63 

reminds  our  British  cousins  of  the  old  adage  con- 
cerning "  those  who  live  in  glass  houses,"  etc. 

"  From  the  time  of  Jack  Cade,"  says  he,  "  to 
Lord  George  Gordon,  and  down  to  the  present 
day,  neither  your  grave  or  gay  authorities  on  the 
subject  of  bundling  and  tarrying  are  worthy  of 
criticism.  There  is  a  littleness  in  noticing,  in  the 
London  Quarterly  Review^  a  work  which  hereto- 
fore has  been  distinguished  for  its  taste,  chaste- 
ness  and  celebrity,  the  observation  of  travelers 
who,  if  men  of  truth,  could  only  mean  to  mention 
customs  (if  they  were  customs)  of  the  most 
vulgar  and  ignorant,  which  at  any  rate  are  now 
as  little  known  as  are  the  operation  of  the  blue 
laws  of  Connecticut,  or  part  of  the  penal  code 
enacted  to  keep  in  slavery  and  subjection  the 
sister  kingdom.* 

"Englishmen,  examine  your  own  cottages, 
particularly  in  the  north,  and  on  the  borders,  and 
extend  your  view  to  the  western    extremity   of 

•  Ireland. 


64  Bundling. 

your  islaud.  Pray,  what  term  will  you  give  to 
that  promiscuous  bundling  of  the  father,  mother, 
children,  sons  and  daughters-in-law,  cousins,  and 
inmates  who  call  to  tarri/,  and  not  unfrequently 
stretch  themselves  in  one  common  bed  of  straw 
on  the  hovel's  floor  ?  * 

"Nay,  even,  in  some  parts  of  your  empire, 
the  hogs  and  the  cows  join  the  group,  and  form 
a  most  audible  respiration  from  their  noses,  get- 
ing  vent  through  the  hole  in  the  roof  intended 
for  a  chimney,  or  spreading  throughout  the  clay 
built  edifice  with  odorific  sweetness,  though  per- 
haps not  so  fragrant  and  refreshing  as  was  the 
precious  oil  poured  on  the  venerable  head  of 
Aaron,  which  Sternhold  and  Hopkins  tell  us 
filled  the  room  with  pleasure.  In  the  early  set- 
tlement of  this  country  there  might  have  been 
houses  in  tlie  route  of  the  inquisitive  and  insidi- 


*  'ihe  Beviewen  Reviewed,  or  British  Falselwods  detected  by 
American  Trutlis  (New  York,  published  by  R.  M'Dermot  and 
D.  D.  Arden,  No.  1,  City  Hotel,  Broadway,  1815,  ISmo,  72), 
pp.  34,  35. 


Bundling;.  G5 

0U8  European  travelers,  unprovided  witli  a  spare 
bed  on  which  he  might  stretch  his  limbs ;  but, 
now,  should  Mr.  Canning*  himself  visit  us,  he 
need  not  fear  being  bundled — he  need  not  travel 
far  in  any  part  of  the  United  States  without  enjoy- 
ing the  luxury  of  a  soft  couch  and  clean  sheets, 
where  he  can  ruminate  on  the  injustice  he  at- 
tempts on  our  national  character." 

Badinage,  ridicule  and  misrepresentation  aside, 
however,  there  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt  that 
bundling  did  prevail  to  a  very  great  extent  in 
the  Kew  England  colonies  from  a  very  early 
date.  It  is  equally  evident  that  it  was  originally 
confined  almost  entirely  to  the  lower  classes  of 
the  community,  or  to  those  whose  limited  means 
compelled  them  to  economize  strictly  in  their 
expenditure  of  firewood  and  candlelight.  Many, 
perhaps  the  majority,  of  the  dwellings  of  the 
early  settlers,  consisted  of  but  one  room,  in 
which  the  whole  family  lived  and  slept.     Yet 


*  The  Right  Honorable  Sir  George  Canning,  the  editor  of  the 
London  Quarterly  Ilemew. 


66  Bundling. 

their  innocent  and  generous  hospitality  forbade 
that  the  stranger,  or  the  friend  whom  night  over- 
took on  their  threshold,  should  be  turned  shelter- 
less and  couchless  away,  so  long  as  they  could 
offer  him  even  half  of  a  bed.  As  an  example  of 
this  we  may  cite  the  case  of  Lieut.  Anbury,  a 
British  officer,  who  served  in  America  during 
the  Revolutionary  War,  and  whose  letters  pre- 
serve many  sprightly  and  interesting  pictures  of 
the  manners  and  customs  of  that  period.  In  a 
letter  dated  at  Cambridge,  New  England,  No- 
vember 20, 1777,  he  thus  speaks : 

"The  night  before  we  came  to  this  town 
[Williamstown,  Mass.],  being  quartered  at  a 
small  log  hut,  I  was  convinced  in  how  innocent 
a  view  the  Americans  look  upon  that  indelicate 
custom  they  call  bundling.  Though  they  have 
remarkable  good  feather  beds,  and  are  extremely 
neat  and  clean,  still  I  preferred  my  hard  mattress, 
as  being  accustomed  to  it;  this  evening,  how- 
ever, owing  to  the  badness  of  the  roads,  and  the 
weakness   of   my  mare,    my  servant  had   not 


Bundling.  67 

arrived  with  my  baggage  at  the  time  for  retiring 
to  rest.  There  being  only  two  beds  in  the 
house,  I  inquired  which  I  was  to  sleep  in,  when 
the  old  woman  replied,  'Mr.  Ensign,' here  I 
should  observe  to  you,  that  the  'New  England 
people  are  very  inquisitive  as  to  the  rank  you 
have  in  the  army  ;  '  Mr.  Ensign,'  says  she,  '  our 
Jonathan  and  I  will  sleep  in  this,  and  our  Je- 
mima and  you  shall  sleep  in  that.'  I  was  much 
astonished  at  such  a  proposal,  and  offered  to  sit 
up  all  night,  when  Jonathan  immediately  replied, 
'  Oh,  la!  Mr.  Ensign,  you  wont  be  the  first  man 
our  Jemima  has  bundled  with,  will  it  Jemima  ?  * 
wlien  little  Jemima,  who,  by  the  bye,  was  a  very 
pretty,  black-eyed  girl,  of  about  sixteen  or  seven- 
teen, archly  replied,  '  No,  father,  not  by  man}-, 
but  it  will  be  with  the  first  Britainer'  (the  name 
they  give  to  Englishmen).  In  this  dilemma  what 
could  I  do?  The  smiling  invitation  of  pretty 
Jemima  —  the  eye,  the  lip,  the — Lord  ha' 
mercy,  where  am  I  going  to  ?  But  wherever  I 
may  be  going  now,  I  did  not  go  to  bundle  with 


68  Bundling. 

her — in  tlie  same  room  "with  her  father  and 
mother,  my  kind  host  and  hostess  too !  I  thought 
of  that — I  thought  of  more  besides — to  strug- 
gle with  the  passions  of  nature ;  to  clasp  Jemima 
in  my  arms — to  —  do  what?  you'll  ask — why, 
to  do  —  nothing!  for  if  amid  all  these  tempta- 
tions, the  lovely  Jemima  had  melted  into  kind- 
ness, she  had  been  an  outcast  from  the  world  — 
treated  with  contempt,  abused  by  violence,  and 
left  perhaps  to  perish !  No,  Jemima ;  I  could 
have  endured  all  this  to  have  been  blest  with  you, 
but  it  was  too  vast  a  sacrifice,  when  you  was  to 
be  the  victim!  Suppose  how  great  the  test  of 
virtue  must  be,  or  how  cold  the  American  con- 
stitution, when  this  unaccountable  custom  is  in 
hospitable  repute,  and  perpetual  practice."* 

Again,  in  a  subsequent  letter,  the  Lieutenant, 
after  describing  a  New  England  sleighing  frolic, 
says:     "In   England  this  would  be   esteemed 


*  Travds  through  Uie  Interior  Parts  cf  America;  in  a  Seriet 
of  Letters  (by  an  officer ;  a  new  edition,  London,  1781,  8vo), 
vol.  II,  pp.  37-40. 


Bundling.  69 

extremely  imprudent,  and  attended  with  danger- 
ous consequences;  but,  after  what  I  have  re- 
lated respecting  huiidling^  I  need  not  say,  in  how 
innocent  a  view  this  is  looked  upon.  Apropos, 
as  to  that  custom,  arong  the  sea  coast,  by  a  con- 
tinual intercourse  among  Europeans,  it  is  in  some 
measure  abolished;  but  they  still  retain  one 
something  similar,  which  is  termed  tarryiwj. 
When  a  young  man  is  enamored  of  a  woman, 
and  wishes  to  marry  her,  he  proposes  the  affair 
to  her  parents  (without  whose  consent  no  mar- 
riage, in  this  colony,  can  take  place);  if  they 
have  no  objections,  he  is  allowed  to  tarry  with 
her  one  night,  in  order  to  make  his  court.  At 
the  usual  time  the  old  couple  retire  to  bed,  leav- 
ing the  young  ones  to  settle  matters  as  they  ca!i, 
who  having  sat  up  as  long  as  they  think  proper, 
get  into  bed  together  also,  but  without  putting  off 
their  under  garments;  to  prevent  scandal.  If 
the  parties  agree,  it  is  all  very  well,  the  banns 
are  published,  and  they  married  without  delay  ; 
if  not,  they  part,  and  possibly  never  see  each 


70  Bundling. 

other  again,  unless,  wliich  is  an  accident  that 
seldom  happens,  the  forsaken  fair  proves  preg- 
nant, in  which  case  the  man,  unless  he  absconds, 
is  obliged  to  marry  her,  on  pain  of  excommuni- 
cation."* 

The  word  tarry,  in  the  sense  of  to  stop  or  to 
stay^  was  more  used  by  our  ancestors  than  by  the 
present  generation;  yet  we  think  that  Lieut. 
Anbury  was  mistaken  in  his  idea  that  the  tarry- 
iyig  was  but  for  a  single  night.  It  is  true  that 
marriages  Avere  enrly,  and  probably  the  court- 
ships were  short,  but  we  all  know  enough  of 
New  England  sparking  to  know  that  a  single 
night  was  cutting  it  rather  short;  and  yet  it  is 
easy  to  see  how  Anbury  should  get  his  erroneous 
idea.  True,  if  the  lover  was  so  unlucky  as  to 
get  his  final  dismissal  the  first  night,  there  was 
an  end  of  the  matter,  and  well  might  they  fail  to 
meet  again;  but,  in  that  case,  it  is  not  likely  that 
the   favors  of  which   he  could  boast  would  be 


*  Anbury's  Travels,  pp.  87,  88. 


Bundling.  71 

such  as  to  seriously  affect  the  reputation  of  the 
girl  with  whom  he  tarried.  The  fact  that  in  the 
custom  of  tarrjing,  the  parties  also  bundled^  does 
not  authorize  the  synonymous  use  of  the  two 
words',  which  have  nothing  in  common.  For, 
doubtless  many  young  men  tarried  with  their 
sweethearts,  who  did  not  bundle  with  them. 

Again,  when,  on  a  sabbath  night,  the  faith- 
ful swain  arrived,  having,  perhaps,  walked  ten 
or  more  weary  miles,  to  enjoy  the  company  of 
his  favorite  lass,  in  the  few  brief  hours  which 
would  elapse  before  the  morning  light  should  call 
him  again  to  his  homeward  walk  and  his  week  of 
toil,  was  it  not  the  dictate  of  humanity  as  well 
as  of  economy,  which  prompted  the  old  folks  to 
allow  the  approved  and  accepted  suitor  of  their 
daughter  to  pursue  his  wooing  under  the  downy 
coverlid  of  a  good  feather  bed  (oftentimes,  too, 
in  the  very  same  room  in  which  they  themselves 
slept),  rather  than  to  have  them  sit  up  and  burn 
out  uselessly  firewood  and  candles,  to  say  nothing 
of  the  risk  of  catching  their  death  a'  cold?    In- 


72  Bundling. 

deed,  was  not  the  sanction  of  bundling  in  such 
cases  a  tacit  admission,  on  the  part  of  the  pa- 
rents, of  their  perfect  confidence  in  the  young 
folks,  which  necessarily  acted  upon  the  latter  as, 
at  once,  a  strong  restraint  from  wrong,  'and  a 
srong  incentive  to  right  doing  ?  The  influence 
of  early  religious  training,  the  powerful  control 
which  the  church  had  obtained  upon  the  social 
and  domestic  life  of  the  people,  and  the  supersti- 
tious aspect  which,  in  those  days,  the  gospel  was 
made  to  wear,  must  also  be  taken  into  the 
account.  And,  moreover,  is  it  not  probable 
that  the  universality  of  the  custom,  which  cer- 
tainly cleared  it  from  anything  like  odium  or 
reproach,  would  naturally  tend  to  preclude,  in  a 
degree,  any  improper  ideas  in  the  minds  of  those 
who  practiced  it  ?  Such,  then,  we  consider  the 
status  of  the  custom  in  the  earlier  history  of  the 
colonies,  and  among  the  first  generation  of  set- 
tlers. 

"  But,"  if  the  reader   will  allow   us  to  quote 
from  a  previous  work,  "  the  emigration  from  a 


Bundling.  73 

civilized  to  a  new  countrj,*  is  necessarily  a  step 
backward  into  barbarism.  The  second  generation 
did  not  till  the  places  of  the  lathers.  Reared 
amid  the  trials  and  dangers  of  a  new  settlement, 
they  were  in  a  great  measure  deprived  of  the 
advantages,  both  social  and  educational,  which 
their  parents  had  enjoyed.  Xoarly  all  of  tlie 
former  could  write,  which  cannot  be  said  of 
their  children.  Neither  did  the  latter  possess 
that  depth  of  religious  feeling,  or  earnest  practi- 
cal piety  which  distinguished  the  first  comers. 
Religion  was  to  them  less  a  matter  of  the  heart 
than  of  social  privilege,  and  in  the  half  way 
covenant  controversy  we  behold  the  gradual  let- 
ting down  of  bars  between  a  pure  church  and  a 
grasping  world. 

"  The  third  generation  followed  in  the  foot- 
steps of  their  predecessors.  Then  came  war; 
and  young  New  England  brought  from  the  long 
Canadian  campaigns,  stores  of  loose  camp  vices, 


*  History  and  Oenecdogies  of  Ancient  Windsor,  Conn.,  Tp.  495. 


74  Bundling. 

and  recklessness,  which  soon  flooded  the  land 
with  immorality  and  infidelity.  The  church  was 
neglected,  drunkenness  fearfully  increased,  and 
social  life  was  sadly  corrupted."  * 


*  The  Rev.  AlonzoB.  Chapin,  iahh  Ilisiori/  of  Ancient  Glas- 
tenbury,  Conn.  (p.  80),  says  that  the  church  records,  during  the 
pastorate  of  the  Rev.  John  Eels  [1759-1791],  "compel  us  to 
believe  that  the  influence  of  the  French  war  had  been  as  unfa- 
vorable to  morals  as  destructive  to  life ;  and  that  the  absurd 
practice  of  bundling  j)revalent  in  those  days,  was  not  infre- 
quently attended  with  the  consequences  that  might  have  been 
expected,  and  that  both  together,  aided  by  a  previous  growing 
laxity  of  morals,  and  accelerated  by  nianj^  concurrent  causes, 
had  rolled  a  tide  of  immorality  over  the  land,  which  not  even 
the  bulwark  of  the  church  had  been  able  to  withstand.  The 
church  records  of  the  first  society,  from  1760  to  1790,  raise 
presumptions  of  the  strongest  kind,  that  then,  as  since,  incon- 
tinence and  intemperance  were  among  the  sins  of  the  people. 
What  the  condition  of  things  in  Eastbury  [an  ecclesiastical 
societj'  in  the  east  part  of  Glasteubury]  was,  we  have  no  means 
of  knowing,  as  that  portion  of  the  church  record^  which  treats  of 
this  point,  was  long  ago  carefully  removed.  [N.  B.  Italics  are 
our  own.]  There  is  no  reason,  however,  to  suppose  that  this 
state  of  things  was  peculiar  to  Glastenbury,  for  there  is  too 
much  evidence  that  it  prevailed  throughout  the  country." 

Mr.  Chapin's  deductions  from  the  revelations  of  the  Glas- 
tenbury records,  will  be  fully  justified  by  the  experience  and 
observation  of  every  antiqvianau  who  has  had  occasion  to  dig 
deep  among  the  civO  and  ecclesiastical  records  of  almost  any 
one  of  the  older  towns  of  New  England.  We  have  before 
us,  while  writing,  a  copy,  made  some  years  since,  by  ourselves, 


Bundling.  75 

It  is  not,  therefore,  a  matter  of  surprise  that 
bundling  should,  in  the  increased  laxity  of  pub- 
lic morals,  become  more  frequently  abused.  Its 
pernicious  effects  became  constantly  more  ap- 
parent, and  more  decidedly  challenged  the  atten- 
tion of  the  comparatively  few  godly  men  a\'1io 
end  'iivored  to  stem  and  to  control  the  rajiidly 
widening  current  of  immorality  which  threatened 
to  overwhelm  the  land.*     The  powerful  intel- 


of  the  records  of  the  first  cliurch  of  Woodstock,  Conn.,  cover- 
ing the  period  from  1727  to  1777,  in  which  are  a  large  number 
of  entries,  mostly  the  names  of  parties  who  made  confessimts 
of  this  sort  before  that  church.  Those  cases  occur  most  fre- 
quently between  the  j-ears  1787  and  1770.  Our  own  observa- 
tion among  the  records  of  the  old  churches  in  Windsor  and 
East  Windsor,  is,  in  effect,  the  same,  and  we  have  occasionally 
happened  upon  the  original  manuscript  confessions  of  indi- 
viduals read  to  the  church  before  they  were  formally  adniilled 
to  its  communion. 

*  HMory  of  Dedham,  Mass.  (by  Erastus  Worthington,  1827), 
page  108.  Under  ministry  of  Rev.  Jason  Haven,  ordained 
February  6,  1756. 

"Revolutionary  times  having  produced  a  disposition  to  invitj- 
tigate  all  the  former  princijilos  and  opinions  of  men,  in  polif  ic^ 
and  church  government,  JNIr.  Haven  caused  the  mode  of 
admission  into  the  church  to  be  altered.  This  was  done  in 
1793.  The  new  method  required  the  candidate  to  be  jiro- 
pounded  to  the  congregation  by  the  minister.     If  no  objections 


76  BuiVULixG. 

lect  of  Jonathan  Edwards  thundered  its  anathe- 
mas upon  it;  pious  divines  prayed  against  it  in 


within  fourteen  days  were  made,  lie  was  then  of  course 
admitted.  At  the  same  time  the  church  covenant  and  creed 
was  altered,  and  made  very  general  in  its  expressions.  This 
creed  had  so  few  articles,  that  all  i^ersons  professing  and 
calling  themselves  Christians,  Would  assent  to  it  without  any 
objections.  The  church  had  ever  in  this  place  requked  of  its 
members  guilty  of  unlawful  cohabitation  before  marriage,  a 
public  confession  of  that  crime  before  tlie  whole  congregation. 
The  oflfending  female  stood  in  the  broad  aisle  beside  the 
partner  of  her  guilt.  If  they  had  been  married,  the  declara- 
tion of  the  man  was  silently  assented  to  by  the  woman.  Tliis 
had  always  been  a  delicate  and  difficult  subject  for  church 
discipline.  The  public  confession,  if  it  operated  as  a  cor- 
rective, likewise  produced  merriment  with  the  profane.  I 
have  seen  no  instance  of  a  public  confession  for  this  fault, 
until  the  ministry  of  Mr.  Dexter  [1724r-175.5],  and  then  they 
were  extremely  rare.  In  1781  the  church  gave  the  confessing 
parties  the  privilege  of  making  a  private  confession  to  the 
church,  in  the  room  of  a  public  confession.  In  Mr.  Haven's 
ministry,  the  number  of  cases  of  unlawful  cohabitation  iii- 
creased  to  an  alarming  degree.  For  twenty-five  years  before 
1781,  twenty-five  cases  had  been  publicly  acknowledged 
before  the  congregation,  and  fourteen  cases  within  the  last 
ten  years.  This  brought  out  the  minister  to  preach  on  the 
subject  from  the  pulpit.  Mr.  Haven,  in  a  long  and  me- 
morable discourse,  sought  out  the  cause  of  the  growing  sin, 
and  suggested  the  proper  remedy.  He  attributed  the  frequent 
recurrence  of  the  fault  to  the  custom  then  prevalent,  of  fe- 
males admitting  young  men  to  their  beds,  who  sought  theii 


Bundling.  77 

their  closets,  aud  wrestled  with  it  in  their  pul- 
pits; while  many  attempted  by  a  revision  of 
their  church  polity,  by  greater  carefulness  in  the 
admission  of  members ;  by  rules  more  stringently 
framed  and  enforced,  to  preserve,  as  best  they 
might,  the  purity  of  the  churches  committed  to 
their  charge,  aud  to  make  them,  if  it  were  possi- 


company  with  intentions  of  marriage.  Aud  he  exhorted  all 
to  abandon  that  custom,  and  no  longer  expose  themselves  to 
temptations  which  so  many  were  found  unable  to  resist. 

"  The  immediate  effect  of  this  discourse  on  the  congrega- 
tion has  been  described  to  me,  and  was  such  as  we  must 
natiu-ally  suppose  it  would  be,  A  grave  man,  the  beloved 
and  revered  pastor  of  tlie  congregation,  conies  out  suddenly 
on  his  audience,  and  discusses  a  subject  on  which  mu'th  and 
merriment  only  had  been  heard,  and  denoiinces  a  favorite 
custom.  The  females  blushed  and  hung  down  their  heads. 
The  men,  too,  hung  down  their  heads,  and  now  and  then 
looked  out  from  under  their  fallen  eyebrows,  to  observe  how 
others  supported  the  attack.  If  the  outward  appearance  of 
the  assembly  was  somewhat  composed,  there  was  a  violent 
internal  agitation  in  many  minds.  And  now,  when  forty-five 
years  have  expired,  the  persons  who  were  present  at  the 
delivery  of  that  sermon,  express  its  effects  by  saying :  '  How 
queerly  I  felt ! '  *  What  a  time  it  was ! '  '  This  was  close 
preaching  indeed ! '  The  custom  was  abandoned.  The  sexes 
learned  to  cultivate  the  proper  degree  of  delicacy  in  their  in- 
tercourse, and  instances  of  unlawful  cohal)itation  in  this  town 
BJnce  that  time  have  been  extremely  rare." 


78  Bundling. 

ble,  beacou  lights  amid  the  surrounding  darkness 
of  the  times.*  The  task,  however,  was  well 
nigh  hopeless.  The  French  wars  were  succeeded 
by  that  of  the  American  Revolution,  and  not 
before  the  close  of  that  struggle,  may  the  custom 
of  bundling  be  said  to  have  received  its  death- 
blow, and  even  then  it  died  hard. 


*Butler's  History  of  Groton  (Pepperell  &  Shirley),  page  174. 
At  a  church  meeting,  Feb.  29,  1739-40,  the  subject  of  com- 
pelling persons  to  confess  themselves  guilty  of  an  offense,  of 
which  they  said,  "  if  not  absolutely,  yet  next  to  impossible  to 
convict  them,"  was  acted  upon,  and  some  relaxation  made  in 
the  rule  before  adopted ;  but  a  part  of  the  record  is  so  worn 
as  to  be  illegible. 

Page  177.  June  1,  1761.  "  The  church  also  at  this  meeting, 
voted  in  relation  to  the  confession  necessary  to  be  made  by 
parents,  to  entitle  theu-  children  to  the  rite  of  baptism,  wlio 
might  be  supposed  to  have  committed  the  offence  of  which,  iu 
Mr.  Trowbridge's  time,  they  supposed  that,  'if  not  absolutely, 
yet  next  to  impossible  to  convict  them,'  not  materially  varying 
from  a  seven-months  rale  heretofore  adopted.  These  regula- 
tions were  signeil  by  the  moderator,  and  assented  to  by  the 
pastor  elect." 

Page  181.  "During  Mr.  Dana's  ministry [1761-1775]  124 
pei'sons  (38  males,  86  females)  were  admitted  to  the  church  ia 
full  communion ;  200  (77  males,  123  females)  owned  the  bap- 
tismal covenant.  Of  the  first  class,  14  confessed  having  com- 
mitted the  ofitence  aforementioned,  and  of  the  last  class,  66,  a 
proportion  not  indicative  of  good  customs  and  morals." 


Bundling.  79 

Its  final  disuse  was  brought  about  by  a  variety 
of  causes,  among  which  may  be  named  the  im- 
proved condition  of  the  people  after  the  Revolu- 
tion, enabling  many  to  live  in  larger  and  better 
warmed  houses,  and  in  the  very  few  places 
where  the  ministers  dared  to  touch  the  subject  in 
the  pulpit,  as  in  Dedham,  already  referred  to,  a 
decided  effect  was  produced,  but  it  was  confined 
to  the  neighborhood,  having  very  little  effect  on 
the  general  custom.  Probably  no  single  thing 
tended  so  much  to  break  up  the  practice  as  the 
publication  of  a  song,  or  ballad,  in  an  almanac, 
about  1785. 

This  ballad  described  in  a  free  and  easy  style 
the  various  plans  adopted  by  those  who  bundled, 
and  rather  more  than  hinted  at  the  results  in  cer- 
tain cases.  Being  published  in  an  almanac,  it 
had  a  much  larger  circulation  than  could  have 
been  obtained  for  it  in  any  other  way  (tract  so- 
cieties not  being  then  in  vogue),  and  the  descrip- 
tions were  so  pat^  that  each  one  who  saw  them 
was  disposed  to  apply  them   in  a  joking  way  to 


/ 
80  Bundling. 


any  other  who  was  known  to  practice  bundling ; 
and  the  result  was,  such  a  general  storm  of 
banter  and  ridicule  that  no  girl  had  the  courage 
to  stand  against  it,  and  continue  to  admit  her 
lovers  to  her  bed. 

We  have  found  many  persons  who  distinctly 
remember  the  publication  of  this  song,  and  the 
effect  which  it  had  on  the  public  mind,  but  all 
our  efforts  to  find  the  almanac  containing  it,  have 
proved  of  no  avail. 

We  have,  however,  been  favored  with  the  use 
of  a  broadside  copy  of  a  ballad,  preserved  among 
the  treasures  of  the  American  Antiquarian  So- 
ciety, at  Worcester,  Massachusetts,  which  seve- 
ral of  our  ancient  friends  have  recognized  as 
identical  with  that  in  the  almanac,  one  of  them 
proving  it  by  repeating  from  memory  several  lines 
from  the  Almanac  version,  which  were  precisely 
like  that  of  the  broadside,  a  copy  of  which  we 
give  herewith. 


Bundling.  81 

A  NEW  BUi^DLma  SON'G; 

Orareproof  io  those  Young  Country  Women,  who  follow  that 
reproachful  Practice,  and  to  their  Mothers  for  upholding  them 
therein. 

Since  buudliug  very  much  abounds, 
In  many  parts  in  country  towns, 
No  doubt  but  some  will  spurn  my  song, 
And  say  I'd  better  hold  my  tongue ; 
But  none  I'm  sure  will  take  offence, 
Or  deem  my  song  impertinence, 
But  only  those  who  guilty  be, 
And  plainly  here  their  pictures  see. 
Some  maidens  say,  if  through  the  nation, 
Bundling  should  quite  go  out  of  fashion. 
Courtship  would  lose  its  sweets;  and  they 
Could  have  no  fun  till  wedding  day. 
It  shant  be  so,  they  rage  and  storm. 
And  country  girls  in  clusters  swarm. 
And  fly  and  buz,  like  angry  bees. 
And  vow  they'll  bundle  when  they  please. 
Some  mothers  too,  will  plead  their  cause, 
And  give  their  daughters  great  applause. 


/ 

/ 


82  Bundling. 

And  tell  tliem,  'tis  no  sin  nor  shame. 
For  we,  jour  mothers,  did  the  same; 
We  hope  the  custom  ne'er  will  alter, 
But  wish  its  enemies  a  halter. 
Dissatisfaction  great  appear'd, 
In  several  places  where  they've  heard 
Their  preacher's  bold,  aloud  disclaim 
That  bundling  is  a  burning  shame; 
This  too  was  cause  of  direful  rout 
And  talk'd  and  told  of,  all  about, 
That  ministers  should  disapprove 
Sparks  courting  in  a  bed  of  love. 
So  justified  the  custom  more, 
Than  e'er  was  heard  or  known  before. 
The  pulpit  then  it  seems  must  yield, 
And  female  valor  take  the  field. 
In  places  where  their  custom  long 
Increasing  strength  has  grown  so  stroLg; 
When  mothers  herein  bear  a  sway, 
And  daughters  joyfully  obey. 
And  young  men  highly  pleased  too, 
Good  Lord  !  what  can't  the  devil  do. 


Bundling.  83 

Can  this  vile  practice  ne'er  be  broke? 

Is  there  no  way  to  give  a  stroke, 

To  wound  it  or  to  strike  it  dead. 

And.  girls  with  sparks  not  go  to  bed 

'Twill  strike  them  more  than  preacher's  tongue, 

To  let  the  world  know  what  they've  done 

And  let  it  be  in  common  fame,  , 

Held  up  to  view  a  noted  shame.  ^ 

Young  miss  if  this  your  practice  be, 

I'll  teach  you  now  yourself  to  see : 

You  plead  you're  honest,  modest  too, 

But  such  a  plea  will  never  do  ; 

For  how  can  modesty  consist, 

With  shameful  practice  such  as  this  ? 

I'll  give  your  answer  to  the  life  : 

"  You  don't  undress,  like  man  wife," 

That  is  your  plea,  I'll  freely  own, 

But  whose  your  bondsmen  when  alone. 

That  further  rules  you  will  not  break, 

And  marriage  liberties  partake  ? 

Some  really  do,  as  I  suppose, 

Upon  design  keep  on  some  clothes. 


84  Bundling. 

And  yet  in  truth  I'm  not  afraid 

For  to  describe  a  bundling  maid ; 

She'll  sometimes  say  when  she  lies  down, 

She  can't  be  cumber'd  with  a  gown, 

And  that  the  weather  is  so  warm, 

To  take  it  off  can  be  no  harm : 

The  girl  it  seems  had  been  at  strift ; 

For  widest  bosom  to  her  shift, 

She  gowuless,  when  the  bed  they're  in, 

The  spark,  nought  feels  but  naked  skin. 

But  she  is  modest,  also  chaste. 

While  only  bare  from  neck  to  waist, 

And  he  of  boasted  freedom  sings, 

Of  all  above  her  apron  strings. 

And  where  such  freedoms  great  are  shar'd 

And  further  freedoms  feebly  bar'd, 

I  leave  for  others  to  relate. 

How  long  she'll  keep  her  virgin  state. 

Another  pretty  lass  we'll  scan, 

That  loves  to  bundle  with  a  man, 

For  many  different  ways  they  take, 

Through  modest  rules  they  all  will  break. 


Bundling.  85 

Some  clothes  I'll  keep  on,  she  will  say, 
For  tliat  has  always  been  my  way, 
]^or  would  I  be  quite  naked  found. 
With  spark  in  bed,  for  thousand  pound. 
But  petticoats,  I've  always  said, 
"Were  never  made  to  wear  in  bed, 
I'll  take  them  off,  keep  on  my  gown, 
And  then  I  dare  defy  the  town, 
To  charge  me  with  immodesty, 
While  I  so  ever  cautious  be. 
The  spark  was  pleased  with  his  maid, 
Of  apprehension  quick  he  said, 
Her  witty  scheme  was  keen  he  swore, 
Tying  in  gown  open  before. 
Another  maid  when  in  the  dark, 
Going  to  bed  with  her  dear  spark, 
She'll  tell  him  that  'tis  rather  shocking. 
To  bundle  in  with  shoes  and  stockings. 
Nor  scrupling  but  she's  quite  discreet, 
Lying  with  naked  legs  and  feet, 
"With  petticoat  so  thin  and  short, 
That  she  is  scarce  the  better  for't ; 
8 


86  Bundling. 

But  you  will  say  that  I'm  unfair, 

That  some  who  bundle  take  more  care, 

For  some  we  may  with  truth  suppose, 

Bundle  in  bed  with  all  their  clothes. 

But  bundler's  clothes  are  no  defence, 

Unly"^  horses  push  the  fence ; 

A  certain  fact  I'll  now  relate, 

That's  true  indeed  without  debate. 

A  bundling  couple  went  to  bed, 

With  all  their  clothes  from  foot  to  head, 

That  the  defence  might  seem  complete. 

Each  one  was  wrapped  in  a  sheet. 

But  0!  this  bundling's  such  a  uitch 

The  man  of  her  did  catch  the  itch, 

And  so  provoked  was  the  wretch, 

That  she  of  him  a  bastard  catch'd. 

Ye  bundle  misses  don't  you  blush, 

You  hang  your  heads  and  and  bid  me  hush. 

If  you  wont  tell  me  how  you  feel, 

I'll  ask  your  sparks,  they  best  can  tell. 


A  typographical  mistake  for  nnruhj. 


BUNDLIN'G.  87 

But  it  is  custom  you  will  say, 
And  custom  always  bears  the  sway, 
If  I  wont  take  my  sparks  to  bed, 
A  laughing  stock  I  shall  be  made ; 
A  vulgar  custom  'tis,  I  own, 
Admir'd  by  many  a  slut  and  clown, 
But  'tis  a  method  of  proceeding, 
As  much  abhorr'd  by  those  of  breeding. 
You're  welcome  to  the  lines  I've  penn'd, 
For  they  were  written  by  a  friend, 
Who'll  think  himself  quite  well  rewarded. 
If  this  vile  practice  is  discarded. 

The  party  in  favor  of  bundling  were  able,  too, 
to  keep  a  poet^  as  is  shown  by  the  following  bal- 
lad, which  we  transcribe  from  a  printed  copy  pre- 
served by  the  American  Antiquarian  Society. 


88  Bundling. 


A  NEW  SONG 

IN  FAVOUR  OF  COURTING. 

Adam  at  first  was  form'd  of  dust, 
As  scripture  doth  record; 

And  did  receive  a  -wdfe  call'd  Eve, 
From  his  Creator  Lord. 

From  Adam's  side  a  crooked  bride, 
The  Lord  was  pleas'd  to  form; 

Ordaiii'd  that  they  in  bed  might  lay 
To  keep  each  other  warm. 

To  court  indeed  they  had  no  need, 

She  was  his  wife  at  first, 
And  she  was  made  to  be  his  aid, 

"Whose  origin  was  dust. 

This  new  made  pair  full  happy  were, 
And  happy  might  remain'd,, 

If  his  help  mate  had  never  ate. 
The  fruit  that  was  rcstrain'd. 


BUM)L1NG.  S^ 

Tho'  Adam's  wife  destroy'd  M3  life, 

In  manner  that  was  awful ; 
Yet  marriage  now  we  all  allow 

To  be  both  just  and  lawful. 

But  women  must  be  courted  first, 

Because  it  is  the  fashion, 
And  so  at  times  commit  great  crimes, 

Caus'd  by  a  lustful  passion. 

And  now  a  days  there  are  two  ways, 

Which  of  the  two  is  right, 
To  lie  between  sheets  sweet  and  clean, 

Or  sit  up  all  the  night  ? 

But  some  suppose  bundling  in  clothes 

Do  heaven  sorely  vex ; 
Then  let  me  know  which  way  to  go. 

To  court  tho  female  sex. 

Whether  they  must  be  hugg'd  or  kiss'd 
When  sitting  by  the  fire 


90  Bundling. 

Or  wliether  they  in  bed  may  lay, 
Which  doth  the  Lord  require  ? 

But  some  pretend  to  recommend 
The  sitting  up  all  night ; 

Courting  in  chairs  as  doth  appear 
To  them  to  be  most  right. 

^Nature's  request  is,  gram  me  rest, 
Our  bodies  seek  repose; 

Night  is  the  time,  and  'tis  no  crime 
To  bundle  in  your  clothes. 

Since  in  a  bed  a  man  and  maid. 
May  bundle  and  be  chaste, 

It  does  no  good  to  burn  out  wood, 
It  is  a  needless  waste. 

Let  coats  and  gowns  be  laid  aside, 
And  breeches  take  their  flight. 

An  honest  man  and  woman  can 
Lay  quiet  all  the  night. 


Bundling.  91 

In  Genesis  no  knowledge  is 

Of  this  tiling  to  be  got, 
Whether  young  men  did  bundle  then. 

Or  whether  they  did  not. 

The  sacred  book  says  wives  they  took, 
It  don't  say  how  they  courted, 

Wliether  that  they  in  bed  did  lay, 
Or  by  the  fire  sported. 

But  some  do  hold  in  times  of  old, 

That  those  about  to  wed, 
Spent  not  the  night,  nor  yet  the  light 

By  fire,  or  in  the  bed. 

They  only  meant  to  say  they  sent 

A  man  to  chuse  a  bride, 
Isaac  did  so,  but  let  me  know 

Of  any  one  beside. 

Man  don't  pretend  to  trust  a  friend, 
To  el.oose  him  sheep  and  cows, 


y2  Bundling. 

Much  less  a  wife  which  all  his  life 
He  doth  expect  to  house. 

Since  it  doth  stand  each  man  in  hand, 

To  happify  his  life, 
I  would  advise  each  to  he  wise, 

And  chuse  a  prudent  wife. 

Since  bundling  is  not  the  thing, 
That  judgments  will  procure, 

Go  on  young  men  and  bundle  then. 
But  keep  your  bodies  pure. 
(Printed  and  sold  hv  Nsuiiaoiel  Ooverly,  Jun.  Boston.) 

The  foregoing  version  is  evidently  not  com- 
plete, several  verses  having  been  left  out  on 
account  of  their  containing  more  truth  than  poetry, 
but  these  may  be  supplied  from  a  manuscript 
copy,  evidently  made  from  memory,  with  con- 
siderable variations  from  the  printed  copy,  which 
by  no  means  improve  it,  though  the  schoolmaster 
did  his  best,  and  probably  saved  for  us  a  very 


Bundling.  93 

complete  version  of  the  ballad  as  it  passed  from 
mouth  to  mouth  before  the  printed  copj  was 
made. 

It  was  transcribed  from  a  volume  of  manuscript 
ballads  in  the  handwriting  of  Israel  Perkins,  of 
Connecticut,  written  in  1786,  when  he  was 
eighteen  jears  old,  and  teaching  school. 


THE  WHORE  ON  THE  SNOW  CRUST. 

1.  Adam  at  first  was  formed  of  dust, 

As  we  find  on  record ; 
And  did  receive  a  wife  cal'd  Eve, 
Bj  a  creative  word. 

2.  From  Adam's  side  a  crooked  bride, 

We  find  complete  in  form ; 
Ordained  that  they  in  bed  might  lay 
And  keep  each  other  warm. 

8.  To  court  indeed  they  had  no  need, 
She  was  his  wife  at  first, 


94  Bundling. 

And  she  was  made  to  be  his  aid, 
Whose  origin  was  dust. 

4,  This  new  made  pair  full  happy  were, 
And  happy  might  remained, 
If  his  help  meet  had  never  cat 
The  fruit  that  was  restrained. 

6.  Tho'  Adam's  wife  destroyed  his  life 
In  manner  that  is  awfull; 
Yet  marriage  now  we  all  allow 
[To]  Be  both  just  and  lawfull. 

6.  And  now  a  days  there  is  two  ways, 

Which  of  the  two  is  write 
To  lie  between  sheets  sweet  and  clean 
Or  sit  up  all  the  night. 

7.  But  some  suppose  bundling  in  clothea 

The  good  and  wise  doth  vex ; 
Then  let  me  know  which  way  to  go 
To  court  the  fairer  sex. 


Bundling.  95 

8.  "Whether  they  must  be  hug'd  and  buss'd 

When  setting  up  all  night ; 
Or  whether  [they]  in  bed  may  lay, 
Which  doth  reason  invite  ? 

9.  Nature's  request  is,  give  me  rest, 

Our  bodies  seek  repose ; 
Night  is  the  time,  and  'tis  no  crime 
To  bundle  in  our  cloaths. 

10.  Since  in  a  bed,  a  man  and  maid 

May  bundle  and  be  chaste  : 
It  doth  no  good  to  burn  up  wood 
It  is  a  needless  waste 

11.  Let  coat  and  shift  be  turned  adrift, 

And  breeches  take  their  flight, 
An  honest  man  and  virgin  can 
Lie  quiet  all  the  night. 

12.  But  if  there  be  dishonesty 

Implanted  in  the  mind, 


96  Bundling. 

Breeches  nor  smocks,  nor  scarce  padlocks 

The  rage  of  lust  can  bind. 

13.  Gate,  ISTance  and  Sue  proved  just  and  true, 

Tho'  bundling  did  practise  ; 
But  Ruth  beguil'd  and  proved  with  child, 
"Who  bundling  did  dispise. 

14.  Whores  will  be  whores,  and  on  the  floor 

Where  many  has  been  laid, 
To  set  and  smoke  and  ashes  poke, 
Wont  keep  awake  a  maid. 

15.  Bastards  are  not  at  all  times  got 

In  feather  beds  we  know ; 
The  strumpet's  oath  convinces  both 
Oft  times  it  is  not  so. 

16.  One  whorish  dame,  I  fear  to  name 

Lest  I  should  give  offence. 
But  in  this  town  she  was  took  down 
Not  more  than  eia'ht  months  sence. 


Bundling.  97 

17.  She  was  tlie  first,  that  on  snow  crust, 

I  ever  knew  to  gender 
I'll  hint  no  more  about  this  whore 
For  fear  I  should  offend  her. 

18.  'Twas  on  the  snow  when  Sol  was  low, 

And  was  in  Capricorn, 
A  child  was  got,  and  it  will  not 
Be  long  ere  it  is  born. 

19.  Now  unto  those  that  do  oppose 

The  bundling  traid,  i  saj 
Perhaps  there's  more  got  on  the  floor. 
Than  any  other  way. 

20.  Li  ancient  books  no  knowledge  is 

Of  these  things  to  be  got ; 
Whether  young  men  did  bundle  then, 
Or  whether  they  did  not. 

21.  Sence  ancient  book  says  wife  they  took, 

It  dont  say  how  they  courted; 
9 


98  Bundling. 

Whether  young  men  did  bundle  then, 
Or  by  the  fire  sported. 

[But  some  do  hold  in  times  of  old, 

That  those  about  to  wed, 
Spent  not  the  night,  nor  yet  the  light, 

By  fire,  or  in  the  bed.] 

22.  They  only  meant  to  say  they  sent 
A  man  to  choose  a  bride ; 
Isaac  was  so,  but  let  me  know, 
If  any  one  beside. 

33.  Men  don't  pretend  to  trust  a  friend 
To  choose  him  sheep  or  cows ; 
Much  more  a  wife  whom  all  his  life 
He  does  expect  to  house. 

24.  Sence  it  doth  stand  each  one  in  hand 
To  happyfy  his  life ; 
I  would  advise  each  to  be  wise. 
And  choose  a  prudent  wife. 


Bundling.  99 

25.  Sence  bundling  is  not  a  thing 
That  judgment  will  procure ; 
Go  on  young  men  and  bundle  then, 
But  keep  your  bodies  pure. 


Since  this  work  went  to  press  we  have  been 
favored,  by  one  of  our  antiquarian  friends  in 
Massachusetts,  with  a  copy  of  another  poetical 
blast  against  the  practice  of  bundling.  It  was 
written  in  the  latter  part  of  the  last,  or  the  first 
decade  of  the  present  century,  by  a  learned  and 
distinguished  clergyman  settled  in  Bristol  county, 
Massachusetts,  who  was  a  graduate  of  Harvard 
University,  and  a  doctor  of  divinity.  The  ori- 
ginal manuscript  from  Mdiich  our  copy  is  made,  is 
very  carefully  written  out,  with  corrections  ap- 
parently of  a  later  date,  and  now  undoubtedlj? 
appears  for  the  first  time  in  printed  form. 


100  Bundling. 


A  POEM  AGAINST  BUNDLBIG. 

Dedicated  to  y*  Youth  of  both  Sexes. 

1.  Hail  giddy  youth,  inclined  to  mirth, 

To  guilty  amours  prone. 
Come  blush  with  me,  to  think  and  see 
How  shameless  you  are  grown. 

2.  'Tis  not  amiss  to  court  and  kiss, 

Nor  friendship  do  we  blame, 
But  bundling  in,  women  with  men, 
Upon  the  bed  of  shame ; 

8.  And  there  to  lay  till  break  of  day, 
And  think  it  is  no  sin, 
Because  a  smock  and  petticoat 
Have  chanced  to  lie  between. 

4.  Such  rank  disgrace  and  scandal  base, 
All  modest  youth  will  shun, 
For  'twill  infest,  like  plague  or  pest, 
And  you  will  be  undone. 


Bundling.  101 

6.  Let  boars  aud  swine  lie  down  and  twine, 
And  grunt,  and  sleep,  aud  snore, 
But  modest  girls  should  not  wear  tails 
^ov  bristles  any  more. 

6.  Let  rams  the  sheep  mount  up  and  Jeap, 

"Without  restraint  or  blame. 
But  will  young  men  act  just  like  them? 
Oh,  'tis  a  burning  shame  ! 

7.  It  is  not  strange  that  horses  range 

Unfettered  to  the  last, 
But  youthful  lusts  in  fetters  must 
Be  chained  to  virtue  fast. 

8.  Dogs  and  bitches  wear  no  breeches. 

Clothing  for  man  was  made, 
Yet  men  and  women  strip  to  their  linen, 
And  tumble  into  bed. 

9.  Yes,  brutal  youth,  it  is  the  truth, 

Your  modesty  is  gone. 


102  Bundling. 

And  could  you  blush,  you'd  tliiuk  as  much, 
And  cui'se  what  you  have  done. 

^10.  To  have  done  so  some  years  ago, 
Was  counted  more  disgrace 
Than  'tis  of  late  to  propagate 
A  spurious  bastard  race. 

11.  Quit  human  kind  and  herd  with  swme, 

Confess  yourself  an  whore ; 
Go  fill  the  stye,  there  live  and  die, 
Or  never  bundle  more. 

12.  Shall  gentlemen  with  ladies  join 

To  practice  like  the  brutes, 
Then  let  them  keep  with  cattle  and  sheep^ 
And  fodder  on  their  fruits. 

13.  This  cursed  course  is  one  great  source 

Of  matches  undesigned, 
Quarrels  and  strife  twixt  man  and  wife, 
And  bastards  of  their  kind. 


Bundling.  105 

14.  But  -u  excuse  of  this  abuse 
It  oftentimes  is  said, 
Father  and  mother  did  no  other 
Than  strip  and  go  to  bed. 

16.  But  grant  some  did  as  you  have  said, 

Yet  do  they  not  repent, 
And  wish  that  you  may  never  do 
What  they  so  much  lament  ? 

I'o.  A  stupid  ass  can't  be  more  base, 
Thau  are  those  guilty  youth 
Who  fill  with  smart  a  parent's  heart, 
And  turn  it  into  mirth. 

17.  Others  do  plead  hard  for  the  bed, 

Their  health  and  weariness, 
So  drunkards  will  drink  down  their  swill. 
And  call  it  no  excess. 

18.  Under  pretense  of  self  defense, 

Others  will  scold  and  say, 


104  Bundling, 

An  honest  maid  is  chaste  abed 
As  any  other  way. 

19.  But  where's  the  man  that  fii'e  can 

Into  his  bosom  take, 
Or  go  through  coals  on  his  foot  soles 
And  not  a  blister  make  ? 

20.  Temptation's  way  has  led  astray 

The  likeliest  of  you  all, 
And  yet  you'r  found  on  slippery  ground, 
And  think  you  cannot  fall. 

21.  A  female  meek,  with  blushing  cheek. 

Seized  in  some  lover's  arms. 
Has  oft  grown  weak  with  Cupid's  hea/* 
And  lost  her  virgin  charms. 

22.  But  last  of  all,  up  speaks  romp  Moll 

And  pleads  to  be  excused. 
For  how  can  she  e'er  married  be. 
If  bundlino;  be  refused? 


Bundling.  105 

23.  What  strange  mistake  young  women, 
To  hope  for  sparks  this  way  ! 
Your  fond  bold  acts  can't  lay  a  tax 
That  men  will  ever  pay. 

24.  So  cheap  and  free  some  women  be, 

That  men  are  cloyed  with  sweet, 
As  horse  or  cow  starve  at  the  mow 
AVith  fodder  under  feet. 

25.  'Tis  therefore  vain  yourselves  to  screen, 

The  practice  is  accurst, 
It  is  condemned  by  God  and  man, 
The  pious  and  the  just. 

26.  Should  you  go  on,  the  day  will  come, 

"When  Christ  your  Judge  will  say. 
In  bundles  bind  each  of  this  kind. 
And  cast  them  all  away. 

27.  Down  deep  in  hell  there  let  them  dwell, 

And  bundle  on  that  bed ; 
There  burn  and  roll  without  control, 
'Till  all  their  lusts  are  fed. 


106  Bundling. 

The  evidence  presented  in  tlie  preceding  pages, 
establishes,  as  we  think,  the  following  facts  : 

1st.  That  the  custom,  so  far  as  it  pertained  to 
the  American  States,  had  its  origin  as  a  matter 
of  convenience  and  necessity. 

2d.  That  in  all  stages  of  its  history  it  was 
chiefly  confined  to  the  humbler  classes  of  society. 

3d.  That  its  prevalence  may  be  said  to  have 
closed  with  the  eighteenth  century. 

It  is  our  opinion  that  it  came  nearest  to  being 
a  universal  custom  from  1750  to  1780,  and  that 
it  was,  at  all  times,  regarded  by  the  better  classes 
as  a  serious  evil,  and  was  no  more  countenanced 
by  them  then  the  frequenting  of  grog  shops  is  by 
the  better  class  of  the  present  day. 

This  opinion  is  corroborated  by  the  remarks 
of  several  old  persons  whom  we  have  consulted 
as  to  their  recollections  of  the  custom.  Among 
these,  Mr.  B.,  of  East  Haddam,  Ct.,  now  in  his 
95th  year,  says  that  he  well  remembers  it;  that 
it  could  not  be  called  general,  though  frequent 
It  was  not  practiced  among  the  more  intelligent, 


Bundling.  107 

educated  classes,  nor  among  those  who  hved  in 
large,  well  warmed  houses.  He  says  it  was  not 
the  fashion  to  bundle  with  any  chap  who  might 
call  on  a  girl,  but  that  it  was  a  special  favor, 
granted  only  to  a  favorite  lover,  who  might  con- 
sider it  a  proof  of  the  high  regard  which  the 
damsel  had  for  him  ;  in  short,  it  was  onhj  accepted 
lovers  who  were  thus  admitted  to  the  bed  of  the 
fair  one,  and,  as  he  expresses  it,  only  after  long 
continued  urging  in  most  cases.*  He  thinks 
the  fashion  ceased  about  1790  to  1800,  and  in 
consequence  of  education  and  refinement;  and 
that  no  more  mischief  teas  done  then  than  there  is 
now-a-days. 

In  the  same  strain,  also,  spoke  the  genial 
Colonel  H.,  a  native  of  Berlin,  Ct.,  born  in 
1775.  He  was  perfectly  conversant  with  the 
custom,  had  known  the  old  ladies,  in  some  cases, 
to  go  up  stairs  before  retiring,  to  see  that  the 
bundling  couple  were  comfortable,  tuck  'ein  up. 


*  But  this  was  as  late  as  1785  to  1790,  when  the  custom  was 
very  near  its  end. 


108  BUNDLIKG. 

and  put  on  more  bedclothes !  And  stoutl;^ 
asseverated  his  beHef  "that  there  wasn't  any 
more  mischief  done  in  those  days  than  there  ia 
now." 

Indeed,  all  the  old  people  with  whom  we  have 
conversed  on  the  matter,  although  in  some  cases 
a  little  unwilling  to  own  that  they  had  ever  prac- 
ticed it  themselves,  were  unanimous  in  their  be- 
lief that  the  abuse  of  chastity  under  the  bundling 
re^me  was  no  more  frequent  than  it  is  now. 
One  old  gentleman  of  whom  we  have  heard,  in 
reply  to  the  half  reproachful,  half  joking  ques- 
tion of  his  grandson,  whether  he  wasn't  ashamed, 
replied  :  "  Why,  no !  What  is  the  use  of  sit- 
ting up  all  night  and  burning  out  fire  and  lights, 
when  you  could  just  as  well  get  under  kiver  and 
keep  warm  ;  and,  when  you  get  tired,  take  a  nap 
and  wake  up  fresh,  and  go  at  it  again  ?  Why, 
d — n  it,  there  wasn't  half  as  many  bastards  then 
as  there  are  now ! "  * 


•Another,  when  in  his  96th  year,  in  speaking  of  his  know- 
ledge of  the  custom,  after  answering  all  inquiries,  volun- 


Bundling.  109 

Even  within  the  present  century  we  have 
found  traces  of  the  continuance  of  the  practice 
of  hundling,  though  the  instances  are  perhapa 
few,  and  in  some  measure  exceptional.  Until  a 
very  late  day  the  custom  (as  a  matter  of  con- 
venience) was  prevalent  among  the  Dutch  set- 
tlers of  Pennsylvania,  and  it  is  not  improbable 
that  traces  may  still  continue  to  exist  in  some  of 
the  more  remote  counties  of  that  state.  An  old 
schoolmaster  who  flourished  in  Glastenbury,  Ct., 
some  twenty  years  ago,  when  relating  his  expe- 
riences in  teaching  in  southern  Pennsylvania,  and 
speaking  of  boarding  around^  informed  us  that 
when  for  any  reason  he  did  not  choose  to  go  to 
his  boarding  place  for  the  time  being,  he  was 
accustomed  to  stop  at  a  tavern  kept  by  an  honest 
old  Dutchman.     On  one  occasion,  having  asked 


tarily  mentioned  his  own  personal  experience.  "In  my 
younger  days,"  said  he,  and  his  voice  trembled,  more  from 
emotion  then  age,  "  I  was  on  the  bed  with  as  many  as  five  or 
six  young  women,  but  I  thank  God,  that  in  all  my  long  life  I 
have  never  had  carnal  knowledge  of  any  but  my  lawfully 
wedded  wives." 

10 


110  Bundling. 

the  laucliord  if  he  could  stay  over  uight,  he  was 
told  that  he  could ;  and  after  chatting  with  his 
host  through  the  evening,  was  shown  to  bed. 
The  landlord  set  down  the  candle  and  had  gone 
out  of  the  room,  when  our  friend  noticed  the 
only  bed  in  the  room  was  already  occupied,  and 
calling  to  the  host,  notified  him  of  the  fact; 
when  he  cried  back:  "Oh!  dat  ish  only  mine 
taughter ;  she  won't  hurt  nopoty,"  and  coolly 
went  his  way.  And  our  friend  affirmed  that  he 
found  the  daughter  not  only  harmless,  but  also 
quite  competent  to  take  care  of  herself. 

In  iN'ew  England,  we  believe  that  Cape  Cod 
has  the  dubious  honor  of  holding  out  the  longest 
against  the  advance  of  civilization,  bundling,  as 
we  have  it  on  good  authority,  having  been  prac- 
ticed there  as   late   as   1827.*    In   GFreenwich, 


*  A  physician  who  kept  school  on  the  Cape  many  years  ago, 
says  (June,  1869) :  "  It  is  forty  years  since  I  was  engaged  on 
the  Cape  in  teaching  school,  and  a  friend  of  mine  then  related 
to  me  some  of  his  experience  in  a  long  career  of  courtship 
which  included  bundling.  The  family  left  the  happy  couple 
alone.    After  sitting  up  till  nine  or  ten  o'clock,  the  lady 


Bundling.  lit 

New  Jersey,  it  was  in  vogue  in  1816.  In  the 
state  of  New  York  this  custom  came  under 
judicial  cognizance  in  the  year  1804,  when  the 
supreme  court  held,  that  although  bundling  was 
admitted  to  be  the  custom  in  some  parts  of  the 
state,  it  being  proven  that  the  parents  of  the 
girl,  for  whose  seduction  the  suit  was  brought, 
countenanced  her  practicing  it,  they  had  no 
right  to  complain,  or  ask  satisfaction  for  the  con- 
sequences, which,  the  court  say,  naturally  fol- 
lowed it !  "  * 


secures  tlie  fire,  takes  a  light  and  retires,  saying,  you  know 
the  way  up  stairs,  turn  to  the  right,  etc.  At  a  proper  time  he 
follows,  finding  her  nicely  snuggled  under  the  bed  clothes, 
having  previously  put  on  a  very  appropriate  and  secure  night 
dress,  made  neither  like  a  bloomer  or  mantilla,  but  something 
like  a  common  dress,  excepting  the  lower  part,  which  is 
furnished  with  legs,  like  drawers,  properly  attached.  The 
dress  is  di'awn  at  the  neck  and  waist  with  strings  tied  with  a 
very  sti'ong  knot,  and  over  this  is  put  the  ordinary  apparel." 
*  Caines^  Cases,  II,  219 ;  Seger  vs.  Slingerland. 


APPENDIX    I. 


BUNDLING. 

[From  The  Yankee  of  August  13, 1828,  published  at  Portland, 
Maine,  and  edited  by  John  Neal.] 


B 


►Y  Rochefoucault,  in  accounting  for  the  popu- 
lousnees  of  Massachusetts,  the  New  Englanders 
are  charged  with  bundling. 

By  Chastelleux,  whose  book  I  am  not  able  to 
refer  to  now,  the  charge  is  repeated,  and  by  half 
a  score  of  other  honest,  good  natured  people, 
who  have  made  books  about  the  New  World. 

But,  if  you  enquire  into  the  business,  you  are 
pretty  sure  to  be  told,  inquire  where  you  may, 
that  bundling  is  not  known  there.,  but  somewhere 
further  back  in  the  woods,  or  further  down  east. 
Nay,  while  in  every  part  of  the  United  States 
the  multitude  speak  of  bundling  as  the  habit  of 
their  neighbors,  either  east,  west,  north,  or  south, 
where  the  witches  of  the  country  were  located 
about  a  century  ago  by  the  grandfathers  of  this 


114  Appendix. 

generation,  I,  myself,  though  I  have  taken 
trouble  enough  to  learn  the  truth,  have  never  yet 
been  able  to  meet  with  a  case  of  bundling — of 
bundling  proper,  I  should  say — in  the  United 
States,  nor  with  but  one  trustworthy  individual 
who  had  ever  met  with  so  much  as  one  case,  and 
he  had  met  vnth.  but  one,  for  which  he  would 
give  his  word.  These  things  are  trifles ;  but 
when  they  are  told  in  books  that  are  read  and 
trusted  to  throughout  Europe ;  such  books,  too, 
as  that  of  the  Marquis  de  Chastelleux,  or  that  of 
De  Rochefoucault,  it  becomes  a  matter  of  serious 
inquiry.  The  truth  must  be  told,  whate\'er  it  is, 
for  the  truth  cannot  be  so  bad,  whatever  it  may 
be,  as  the  untruth  which  is  nov/  repeated  of  us. 
The  travels  of  Chastelleux  are  translated  by 
an  Englishman  who  had  been  a  long  while  in 
this  country.  The  book  was  undoubtedly  writ- 
ten with  great  care,  b}^  a  very  honest,  able  man, 
who  had  very  good  opportunities  of  knowing  the 
truth  ;  and  is  now  set  off"  by  another  very  honest, 
able  man,  who  was,  if  anything,  rather  partial  to 
America  —  enough  to  make  one  wary  of  trusting 
the  report  of  any  traveler  who  does  not  say  in  so 
many  words,  after  establishing  a  character  for 
himself — I  saw  this;  I  heard  this;  T  take  no- 
body's word  for  what  I  now  say,  etc.,  etc.    It 


Appendix.  115 

would  be  easy  to  enumerate  a  multitude  of  other 
stories  which  are  now  believed  in,  about  the  peo- 
ple of  the  United  States,  not  only  by  the  people 
of  Europe,  and  of  Great  Eritaiu  particularly,  but 
by  the  people  of  the  United  States  themselves. 
But  a  dry  catalogue  of  such  things  would  be  of 
little  use. 

[Here  he  refers  to  the  charge  reported  of  i^ew 
Englanders,  that  that  they  eat  pork  and  molasses  — 
pork  and  molasses  together,  which  is  here  de- 
nied as  a  ridiculous  story.     H.  R.  S.] 

They  bundle  in  Wales;  bundling  there  is 
a  serious  matter.  A  lady — a  Welsh  woman 
whose  word  is  truth  itself —  assured  me  not  long 
ago,  that  in  her  country  they  do  not  think  a  bit 
the  worse,  of  a  girl  for  anticipating  her  duties,  in 
other  words,  for  being  a  mother  before  she  lias 
been  a  wife  ;  they  have  discovered,  perhaps,  that 
cause  and  effect  may  be  convertible  terms ;  that 
in  such  a  serious  matter,  none  but  a  fool  would 
buy  a  pig  in  the  poke,  and  that,  after  all,  mater- 
nity may  lead  to  marriage  there,  as  marriage  leads 
to  maternity  here.  And  why  not?  for  after  the 
establishment  of  the  lying-in  hospitals  of  Russia, 
the  unmarried  who  bore  children  to  the  state  were 
proud  of  the  duty,  and  were  looked  upon,  we  are 
told,  with  great  favor  by  tlie  public.     She  added, 


116  Appendix. 

also,  that  she  was  once  at  a  party  made  up  of 
sixteen  or  eighteen  females,  and  females  of  good 
characters,  all  but  one  or  two  of  whom  were 
mothers,  or  had  been  so,  before  they  were  mar- 
ried. By  Chastelleux  and  his  English  trans- 
lator it  would  appear  to  have  been  very  much  the 
same  in  America  about  the  years  1780-1-2.  It 
is  not  so  now.  To  have  had  a  child  before 
marriage  would  now  be  fatal  to  a  woman  here, 
whatever  might  be  her  condition  or  beauty;  fatal 
in  every  shape.  No  man  would  have  courage  to 
marry  her;  no  woman  of  character  would  asso- 
ciate with  her.  Ask  the  first  individual  you 
meet,  above  the  age  of  twelve  or  thirteen  here, 
and  you  may  have  the  name  and  historj^  of  everj' 
poor  girl  in  the  neighborhood  who  has  been  so 
unlucky  as  to  have  a  child  of  her  own  without 
leave,  perhaps,  within  a  period  of  six  or  eight 
years  in  a  populous  neighborhood  of  twenty  or 
thirty  miles  about.  A  widow  with  half  a  score 
of  children,  forty  years  ago,  if  we  may  believe 
Dr.  Franklin,  was  an  object  for  the  fortune 
hunters  of  America.  It  is  not  so  now.  The 
demand  for  widows,  and  for  every  sort  of  ready 
made  family  is  beginning  to  be  over. 

That  which  is  called  J3undling  here,  though 
bad  enough,  is  not  a  twentieth  part  so  bad.     Here 


Appendix.  117 

it  is  only  a  mode  of  courtship.  The  parties  iii- 
etead  of  sitting  up  together,  go  to  bed  together ; 
but  go  to  bed  with  their  clothes  on.  This 
would  appear  to  be  a  perilous  fashion  ;  but  I 
have  been  assured  by  the  individual  above,  that 
he  had  proof  to  the  contrary;  for  in  the  particu- 
lar case  alluded  to,  the  only  case  I  ever  heard  of 
on  good  authority,  although  he  wa^  invited  by 
the  parents  of  a  pretty  girl  who  stood  near  him, 
to  bundle  with  her,  and  although  he  did  bundle 
with  her,  he  had  every  reason  to  believe,  that  if 
he  had  been  very  free,  or  more  free  than  he 
might  have  been  at  a  country  frolick  after  they 
had  invited  him  to  escort  her,  to  sit  up  with  her, 
to  dance  Avith  her,  he  would  have  been  treated 
as  3,  traitor  by  all  parties.  He  had  a  fair  oppor- 
tunity of  knowing  the  truth,  and  he  spoke  of 
the  matter  as  if  he  would  prefer  the  etiquette  of 
sitting  up  to  the  etiquette  of  going  to  bed  with  a 
girl  who  had  been  so  brought  up.  He  com- 
plained of  her  as  a  prude.  The  following  com- 
munication appears,  however,  to  be  one  that  may 
be  depended  on  :  * 


*In  reply  to  a  query  addressed  to  Mr.  Neal,  who  is  still 
living  at  Portland,  Maine,  as  to  whether  this  letter  was  a 
bona  fide  communication,  that  gentleman  says:     "  It  was  an 


118  Appendix. 

"  Mr  Keal  —  If  jou  wish  to  know  the  truth 
about  bundling,  I  think  your  correspondent 
V.  could  toll  you  all  about  it  —  it  seems  by  his 
confession  that  he  has  practiced  it  on  a  large 
scale.  I  never  heard  of  the  thing  till  about  three 
years  ago  ;  an  acquaintance  of  mine  had  gone  to 
spend  the  summer  with  an  auut,  who  lived  some- 
where near  Sandy  river.*  The  following  is  a 
copy  of  one  of  her  letters  wdiile  there  : 

"'I  should  have  written  sooner,  so  don't  think 
me  unkind,  for  I  have  been  waiting  for  some- 
thing to  write  about.  You  requested  me  to  give 
you  a  faithful  description  of  the  country,  the 
manners  and  customs  of  the  inhabitants,  etc.  I 
have  not  been  here  quite  three  months,  but  1 
have  been  everywhere,  seen  everything,  and  got 
acquainted  with  everybody.  I  shall  certainly  in- 
form you  of  everything  I  have  seen  or  heard  that 
is  worth  relating. 

" '  You  remember  how  you  told  me,  before  I 
left  home,  that  I  was  so  well  looking  that  if  I 


actual  communication  from   a   correspondent.    "Who  that 
correspondent  was,  I  never  knew,  but  I  never  entertained  a 
doubt,  and,  in  fact,  find  such  internal  evidence  of  good  faith, 
ttat  I  shoidd  never  question  tlie  facts  set  forth." 
*  Sandy  river  is  near  Farmingtoii,  Franklin  county,  Maine, 


Apfeindix.  119 

went  so  far  back  in  the  country  1  should  be  very 
much  admired  and  flattered,  and  have  as  many 
lovers  as  I  could  wish  for.  I  find  it  all  true. 
The  people  here  are  remarkably  kind  and  att^i- 
tive  to  me ;  they  seem  to  think  that  I  must  be 
something  more  than  common  because  I  have 
always  lived  so  near  Portland. 

"  *  But  I  must  tell  you  that  shice  I  have  been 
here  I  have  had  a  beau.  You  must  know  that 
the  young  men,  in  particular,  are  very  attentive 
to  me.  Well,  among  these  is  owe  who  is  con- 
sidered the  finest  young  man  in  the  place,  and 
well  he  may  be — he  owns  a  good  farm,  which 
has  a  large  barn  upon  it,  and  a  neat  two  story 
house,  all  finished.  These  are  the  fruits  of  his 
own  industry ;  besides  he  is  remarkably  good 
looking,  is  very  large  but  well-proportioned,  and 
has  a  good  share  of  what  I  call  real  manly  beauty. 
Soon  after  my  arrival  here  I  was  introduced  to 
this  man — no,  not  introduced  neither,  for  they 
never  think  of  such  a  thing  here.  They  all 
know  me  of  course,  because  I  am  a  stranger. 
Some  days,  three,  four,  or  half  a  dozen,  call  to 
see  me,  whom  I  never  before  saw  or  heard  of; 
they  come  and  speak  to  me  as  if  I  were  an  old 
acquaintance,  and  I  converse  with  them  as  freely 
as  if  I  had  always  known  them  from  childhood. 


120  Appendix. 

In  this  kind  of  a  way  I  got  acquainted  witli  my 
beau,  that  was;  lie  was  very  attentive  to  me 
from  our  first  meeting.  If  we  happened  to  be 
going  anywhere  in  company  he  was  sure  to  offer 
me  his  arm  —  no,  I  am  wrong  again,  he  never 
offered  me  his  arm  in  his  life.  If  you  go  to 
walk  with  a  young  man  here,  instead  of  offering 
you  his  arm  as  the  young  men  do  up  our  way,  he 
either  takes  your  hand  in  his,  or  passes  one  arm 
around  your  waist ;  and  this  he  does  with  sucli  a 
provoking,  careless  honesty,  that  you  cannot  for 
your  life  be  offended  with  him.  Well,  I  had 
walked  with  my  Jonathan  several  times  in  this 
kind  of  style.  I  confess  tliere  was  something  in 
him  I  could  not  but  like  —  he  does  not  lack  for 
wit,  and  has  a  good  share  of  common  sense ;  his 
language  is  never  studied  —  he  always  seems  to 
speak  from  the  heart.  So  when  he  asked  what 
sort  of  a  companion  he  would  make,  I  very 
candidly  answered,  that  I  thought  he  would  make 
a  very  agreeable  one.  "  I  think  just  so  of  you,'* 
said  he,  "  and  it  shall  not  be  my  fault,"  he  con- 
tinued, "  if  we  are  not  companions  for  life."  "  We 
shall  surely  make  a  bargain,"  said  he,  after  sit- 
ting silent  a  few  moments,  "  so  we'll  bundle  to- 
night." '' Bundle  whiitt"  I  asked.  "  IF^  will 
bundle  together,"  said  he ;  "  you   surely  know 


Appendix.  121 

what  I  mean."  I  know  that  our  farmers  bundle 
wheat,  cornstalks  and  hay  ;  do  you  mean  that  you 
want  me  to  help  you  bundle  any  of  these  ? " 
inquired  I.  "  I  mean  that  I  want  you  to  stay 
with  me  to-night !  It  is  the  custom  in  this  place, 
when  a  man  stays  with  a  girl,  if  it  is  Avai-m 
weather,  for  them  to  throw  themselves  on  the 
bed,  outside  the  bed  clothes;  if  the  weather  is 
cold,  they  crawl  under  the  clothes,  then  if  they 
have  anything  to  say,  they  say  it  —  when  they 
get  tired  of  talking  they  go  to  sleep ;  this  is  what 
we  call  bundling — -now  what  do  you  call  it  in 
your  part  of  the  world  ? "  "  We  have  no  such 
works,"  answered  I;  *' not  amongst  respectable 
people,  nor  do  I  think  that  any  people  would, 
that  either  thought  themselves  respectable,  or 
wished  to  be  thought  so." 

"'Don't  be  too  severe  upon  us.  Miss ,  I 

have  always  observed  that  those  who  make  be- 
lieve so  much  modesty,  have  in  reality  but  little. 
I  always  act  as  I  feel,  and  speak  as  I  think.  I 
wish  you  to  do  the  same,  but  have  none  of  your 
make-believes  with  me  —  3'ou  smile — you  begin 
to  think  you  have  been  a  little  too  scrupulous  — 
you  have  no  objection  to  bundling  noiv,  have 
you  ?  "  "  Indeed  I  have."  "  I  am  not  to  be 
trifled  with ;  so,  if  you  refuse,  I  have  done  with 
II 


122  Appendix. 

you  forever."  "  Then  be  done  as  quick  as  you 
please,  for  I'll  not  bundle  with  you  nor  with  any 
other  man."  "  Then  farweell,  proud  girl,"  said 
he.  "Farewell,  honest  man,"  said  I,  and  off  he 
went  sure  enough. 

"  '  I  have  since  made  inquiries  about  bundling, 
and  find  that  it  is  really  the  custom  here,  and 
that  thej'  think  no  more  harm  of  it,  than  we  do 
our  way  of  a  young  couple  sitting  up  together. 
I  have  known  an  instance,  since  I  have  been 
here,  of  a  girl's  taking  her  sweetheart  to  a  neigh- 
bor's house  and  asking  for  a  bed  or  two  to  lodge 
in,  or  rather  to  bundle  in.  They  had  company 
at  her  fixther's,  so  that  their  beds  were  occupied; 
she  thought  no  harm  of  it.  She  and  her  family 
are  respectable. 

" '  Grandmother  says  bundling  was  a  very 
common  thing  in  our  part  of  the  country,  in  old 
times ;  that  most  of  the  first  settlers  lived  in  log 
houses,  which  seldom  had  more  than  one  room 
with  afire  place;  in  this  room  the  old  people 
slept,  so  if  one  of  their  girls  had  a  sweetheart  in 
the  winter  she  must  either  sit  with  him  in  the 
room  where  her  father  and  mother  slept,  or  take 
him  into  her  sleeping  room.  She  would  choose 
the  latter  for  the  sake  of  being  alone  with  him ; 
but  sometimes  when  the  cold  was  very  severe, 


Appendix.  123 

rather  than  freeze  to  death,  they  would  crawl 
under  the  bed-clothes;  and  this,  after  a  while, 
became  a  habit,  a  custom,  or  a  fashion.  The  man 
that  I  am  going  to  send  this  by,  is  just  ready  to 
start,  so  I  cannot  stop  to  write  more  now.  In  my 
next  I'll  give  you  a  more  particular  account  of 
the  people  here.     Adieu.' 

"  Mr  Editor,  you  may  be  sure  that  what  is 
related  in  the  foregoing  letter  is  the  truth.  I 
know  that  there  is  considerable  other  information 
in  it,  mixed  up  with  that  about  which  3'ou  wished 
to  be  informed,  but  I  could  not  very  well  sepa- 
rate it." 

So  after  all  that  has  been  said  of  the  practice 
of  bundling  in  our  country,  by  foreign  writers, 
travelers,  and  reviewers  —  after  all  the  reproach 
that  has  been  heaped  upon  us,  now  that  we  are 
able  to  get  at  the  plain  truth,  it  appears  to  be, 
though  certainly  a  bad  practice,  not  half  so  bad 
as  the  junketing  and  sitting  up  courtships  tliat  are 
known  elsewhere.  N'ay,  more.  Though  in  the 
present  state  of  society  it  is  a  practice  that  should 
be  utterly  discountenanced  everywhere,  still  it 
would  seem  to  have  grown  up  out  of  the  peculiar 
circumstances  of  our  first  settlers ;  to  be  confined 
now  to  remote  and  small  districts  (for  I  have 


124  AprExNDix. 

heard  of  only  three  instances,  after  all  my  in- 
quiry) ;  and  to  be  rapidly  going  out  of  practice. 
Yet  more  ;  there  can  be  no  bad  intentions,  there 
can  be  no  evil  consequences,  where  respectable 
and  modest  women  are  not  ashamed  to  acknow- 
ledge that  they  bundle.  I  am  anxious  to  know 
the  truth  for  the  purpose  of  correcting  both  the 
misrepreseniatioiw  that  are  abroad,  and  the  prac- 
tices that  prevail  here.  Bundling,  however,  is 
known  in  other  countries,  where  they  have  less 
excuse,  and  in  Wales  where  they  do  not  bundle, 
as  I  have  said  before,  it  is  no  reproach  for  a 
woman  to  have  had  a  child  before  marriage.  It 
was  80  in  Russia  after  Catharine  established  her 
lying-in  hospitals. 

In  the  next  number  of  The  Yankee  (August 
20th)  there  is  the  following  editorial  paragraph  : 

Bundling. 

There  is  a  great  outcry  just  now  about  the 
paper  on  bundling  which  was  in  the  last  Yankee. 
Now  this  very  outcry  proves  the  want  of  the 
very  paper  alluded  to.  The  article  is  about 
bundling ;  and  people  who  imagine  bundling  to 
be  what  it  is  not,  a  highly  improper  and  unchaste 


Appendix.  125 

familiarity,  are  oftended  with  it;  but  the  very 
purpose  of  that  paper  is  to  show  that  bundling  is 
not  what  it  is  believed  to  be,  that  it  is  neither  so 
common  nor  so  bad,  not  a  fiftieth  part  so  bad  as 
people  have  imagined. 


APPENDIX  II. 


X  HAT  the  customs  of  courtship  in  many  parts 
of  the  United  Kingdom  at  the  present  day,  are 
precisely  what  they  were  in  some  parts  of  'New 
England,  IsTew  Jersey  and  Pennsjdvania,  fifty 
years  ago,  is  evident  from  the  revelations  of  the 
BoT/al  Commission  on  the  Marriage  Laws,  in  the 
year  1868.  Dr.  Strahan,  a  physician  and  surgeon^ 
who  for  nearly  forty  years  has  practiced  in  the 
Scottish  county  of  Stirling,  testifies  before  the 
commission,  that  his  attention  was  first  drawn  to 
the  subject  in  consequence  of  observing  the  very 
great  extent  of  immorality  among  the  working 
classes,  not  only  as  evidenced  by  the  large  num- 
ber of  illegitimate  children,  but  also  by  the  still 
larger  number  of  marriages  after  the  woman  was 
with  child ;  and  the  number  of  children  born 
within  eight  months  of  wedlock.  He  found,  to 
his  astonishment,  that  among  the  working  classes 


128  Ai'i'EXDix. 

(i.  e.j  the  agricultural  laborers),  nine  out  of  ten 
women,  when  married,  either  had  had  illegitimate 
children,  or  were  pregnant  at  the  time  of  mar- 
riage. "  I  have,"  he  sa3's,  "  a  large  midwifery 
practice,  and  I  very  rarely  attend  a  woman  with 
her  first  child,  where  the  child  is  not  born  within 
ii  few  months  of  wedlock,  or  else  she  has  had  au 
illegitimate  child  before."  He  believes  it  is  very 
common  for  women  to  allow  themselves  to  be 
seduced  in  the  hope  of  being  married.  They  go 
on  until  they  are  enceinte,  and  then,  if  the  young 
man  is  at  all  a  decent  fellow,  the  friends  inter- 
fere and  the  marriage  is  hurried  on.  The  sketch 
which  Dr.  Strahan  supplies  of  Scotch  courtships, 
explains  all  this  part  of  his  observation.  Young 
men  and  women  meet  together  at  night,  and  the 
ordinary  time  is  the  middle  of  the  night,  when 
every  one  else  is  in  bed.  "It  is  universal,"  says 
Dr.  Strahan  to  the  commission,  "  among  the 
working  classes,  to  have  this  manner  of  court- 
ship of  which  I  speak;  there  is  no  other  court- 
ship, in  any  other  form ;  the  fathers  and  mothers 
will  not  allow  their  daughters  to  meet  a  young 
man  in  the  day-time ;  the  young  man  never  visits 
the  family,  but  the  parents  quite  allow  this ;  they 
have  done  it  themselves  before,  and  there  is  no 
objection  to  it.     The  young  man  comes,  makes 


AlTENDlX.  129 

u  noise  at  the  window;  the  young  woman  goes 
out,  they  go  to  some  outhouse ;  or  perhaps  the 
young  man  is  admitted  to  the  young  woman's 
bedroom  after  all  are  in  bed,  and  there  is  an  hour 
or  two  of  what  is  called  courtship,  but  which 
would  more  properly  be  called  flirtation,  because 
't  is  not  necessary  thiit  there  should  be  any  en- 
gagement to  marry  in  these  cases." 

Lord  Lyveden  inquired:  "Do  these  meetings 
take  place  at  particular  periods,  such  as  harvest 
time,  or  is  it  over  the  whole  of  the  year?  " 

Answer:  "  The  whole  of  the  year;  very  com- 
monly the  young  man  visits  the  young  woman 
i)uce  a  week." 

Lord  Chelmsford  said :  "  In  England  that 
would  be  called  keeping  company.  It  is  a  very  cx- 
traordinary  way  of  keeping  company  when  the 
l>arents  allow  their  daughter  to  go  out  with  the 
young  man  at  midnight,  or  the  young  man  to 
come  into  her  bedroom." 

Answer:  "Yes;  the  parents  know  no  other 
way  of  doing  it.  I  liave  reasoned  with  the  pa- 
rents often  when  attending  a  case  of  illegitimate 
birth,  pointing  out  to  the  parents  how  it  is  they 
have  been  led  on,  but  they  cannot  imagine  any 
other  way  of  doing  it ;  their  daughters  must  have 
husbands,  and  there  is  no  other  way  of  courting." 


130  Appendix. 

Mr.  Justice  O'Hagan  asking  —  "  Does  it  pre- 
vail generally  iu  Scotland?"  wjia  answered  — 
"  universally  among  the  agricultural  laborers." 

In  reply  to  an  inquiry  by  Mr.  Dunlop,  wdiether 
these  young  men  lived  under  any  kind  of  super- 
vision and  knowledge  of  their  masters,  or  whether 
they  could  go  out  and  in  as  they  [(leased,  Dr. 
Strahan  stated  that  "  plowmen,  for  instance,  very 
often  live  in  bothies,  or  in  the  farm  house;  they 
get  out  after  all  are  in  bed,  out  of  the  window; 
or,  if  they  live  iu  a  bothie,  without  any  trouble. 
They  go  to  the  neighboring  farm-house,  they 
knock  at  the  window,  the  girl  comes  to  tlie 
window,  and,  if  she  know  the  young  man  —  or, 
after  a  little  parley,  if  she  does  not  know  him  — 
she  either  comes  out  and  goes  with  him  to  an  out- 
house, or  he  comes  into  her  bedroom.  You 
must  remember  that  tliey  have  no  other  means  of 
intercourse," 

"  That  is  the  point  you  press  so  much  ?  " 

"Yes;  a  young  woman  cannot  see  either  a 
sweetheart  or  an  acquaintance  in  any  other  way. 
I  believe  if  it  was  not  for  fear  of  being  out  at 
night,  the  girls  would  visit  one  another  in  the 
same  wa}'';  they  have  no  other  means  of  visit- 
ing; the  customs  of  the  country  are  such  that  a 


Appendix.  131 

youug  man  could  not  be  seen  going  in  day-liglit 
to  visit  his  sweethart." 

Mr.  Justice  O'Hagan:  "If  the  father  knew 
that  the  young  man  was  coming  into  the  house, 
and  knew  that  he  was  with  his  daughter,  would 
he  not  interfere  ?  " 

"  He  would  lie  comfortably  in  his  bed,  know- 
ing that  his  daughter  was  in  an  out-house  or  barn 
with  a  young  man,  for  perhaps  two  hours;  shut- 
ting his  eyes  to  it  in  the  same  way  that  a  person 
in  the  higher  ranks  would  shut  his  eyes  to  his 
(Inughter  going  out  for  a  walk  with  a  young  man." 

Dr.  Strahan  said  also:  "When  you  come  to 
the  middle  class  a  young  man  would  not  marry  a 
girl  that  had  had  a  child  to  another  man;  and 
very  probably  he  would  not  marry  a  girl  that  had 
had  a  child  to  himself;  but  in  the  lower  classes 
it  is  not  so;  it  is  almost  universal  to  marry  a 
woman  that  has  had  a  child,  or  that  is  with  child 
to  himself;  but  it  is  very  frequent  to  marry  a 
woman  that  has  had  a  child  to  another  man  ;  the 
only  objection  is  the  burden  of  the  child;  the 
burden  of  the  child  might  be  an  obstacle,  but  the 
disgrace  would  be  none." 

"Is  it  supposed,"  asked  a  commissioner,  "that 
the  woman,  by  marrying  this  other  man,  wipes 
off  hor  diso-race  with  the  former?" 


132  Appendix. 

"Yes;  but  it  is  so  common  that  the  disgrace 
is  not  so  much  as  to  prevent  the  joung  man  mar- 
rying her." 

The  attorney-general :  "  It  is  hardly  within 
our  inquiry,  but  still  it  is  interesting  to  know; 
can  you  tell  me  whether,  in  these  cases,  where 
the  woman  marries  a  man  who  is  not  the  father 
of  her  child,  any  confusion,  as  to  the  parent  of 
the  previously  born  child,  arises  ?  Are  they  apt 
in  law,  to  pass  as  the  children  of  the  subsequent 
nusband  ? " 

"No,  I  do  not  think  so." 

"  The  distinction  is  always  kept  up  ?  " 

"  The  distinction  is  always  kept  up ;  very 
often  the  illegitimate  child  goes  by  his  own 
father's  name,  even  among  the  other  children  ; 
and  I  do  not  think  there  is  apt  to  be  any  confu- 
sion of  that  kind." 

Still,  it  seems  that,  in  severely  Calvinistic 
Scotia,  the  church  does  not  wholly  wink  at  this 
state  of  things.  The  sinning  couple,  after  mar- 
riage, have  to  go  through  a  certain  whitewashing 
at  church  before  they  are  admitted  to  what  are 
called  church  privileges.  They  have  to  go  be- 
fore a  kirk  session,  consisting  of  the  minister  and 
perhaps  half  a  dozen  elders,  when  they  are  ad- 
monished.    K  the  parties  are  married,  they   ap- 


Appendix.  133 

pear  but  once;  if  not  married,  generally  three 
times.  They  tender  themselves  for  rebuke  with- 
out invitation,  as  without  it  the  child  cannot  be 
baptized,  or  admission  given  to  the  sacrament. 
They  apply  to  the  minister  in  private,  and  con- 
fess their  fault,  and  he  causes  them  to  be  sum- 
moned before  the  church  session. 

12 


INDEX. 


A: 


_FRICAN  tribes,  court- 
sliip  among,  42. 
America,  English  misrepre- 
sentation of,  62. 
America,  bundling  in,  44. 
inherits  bundling  from 

Holland,  45. 
bundling  not  peculiar 

to,  13. 
bundling  universal   In 
1750, 106. 


Ballads   against  bundling, 
81,  100. 
in  favor  of  bundling, 
88,  93. 
Brychan,  a  cloth,  23. 
Bundling,  antiquity  of,  14. 
Bundling,  abuse  of,  in  New 
England,  75. 
ballads  on,  81,  88,  93, 

100. 
ceased  with  eighteenth 

century,  106. 
confined  to  ihe  lower 
classes,  107. 


Bundli:.^',  described  by  Lt. 
Anbury  in  1777,  66. 

definition  of,  13. 

decision  of  N.  Y.  Su- 
preme court  on.  111. 

effect  of,  75. 

in  America,  44. 

in  Britisli  isles,  14,  22. 

in  Cape  Cod,  110. 

in  Holland,  35. 
Bundling  in  Maine  about 
1828,  117. 

in  New  England  States, 
48. 

in  Wales,  23,  115. 

introduced  in  America 
from     Holland,    45. 

mentioned      by     Rev. 
Sam'l  Peters,  51. 

mentioned    by    Wash- 
ington Irving,  49. 

menlioned  by  Dr.   A. 
Burnaby,  1759,  58. 

mentioned  by  Sir  Wal- 
ler Scott,  20. 

not  peculiar  to  Ame- 
rica, 13. 


186 


Index. 


Bundling  originating  in 
poverty  in  Scotland 
and  L-elaud,  23. 

origin  of,  14. 

originally  confined  to 
the  lower  classes  in 
America,  65. 

practiced  in  Pennsyl- 
vania till  late  years, 
109. 

preached  against,  54. 

recollections  of  by  old 
persons,  100. 
Bundling  regarded  as  a  seri- 
ous evil,  106. 

sanctioned  by  parents, 
69. 

sermon  against,  77. 

two  forms  of,  13. 

universal  now  in  lower 
classes  of  Scotland, 
130. 

universal  in  America 
in  1750, 106. 

-up,  in  "Wales,  42. 


Cape  Cod,  bundling  prac- 
ticed there  in  1827,  110. 

Central  Asia,  courtship  in, 
42. 

Confession  in  public  neces- 
sary for  baptism  of  child- 
ren, 76. 

Courtship,  customs  of,  in 
Great   Britain,    127. 


Courtship    among    Welsh 
peasantry,  29. 
in  Central  Asia,  43. 
in  the  14th  century,  87. 
among  N.  A.  Indians, 

40. 
in  Switzerland,  38. 
Cuckold,  no  word  in  Gaelic 

for,  21. 
Customs  of  courtship,  dif- 
ferent in  the  cantons  of 
Switzerland,  39. 


Dayaks  of  Borneo,  court- 
ship of,  42. 
Dorfen,  in  Switzerland,  39. 

Empress  Cartismandua,  21, 

Julia,  20. 
Epilogue   on    bundling  at 

Westminster  school,  1815, 

61. 


Free-beftch,  22. 
French  war,  demoralizing 
influence  of,  74. 


Germans,  respect  of,  for 
women,  21. 

Gordon,  Sir  Robert,  19. 
Sir  Adam,  19. 

Great  Britain,  bundling 
common  at  the  pre- 
sent day  in,  126. 


Index. 


137 


Oreat  Britain,  immorality 
of  lower  classes  iu, 
127. 
Gwent,  a  district  in  Wales, 

34. 
Gwentian  Code  of  Wales, 
34. 


Hand-fasting,  a  Scotch  cus- 
tom, 17, 19. 
common     among     all 
classes,  20. 
Highland  law  of  marriage, 

16. 
Highlanders,    curious    cus- 
tom of  the,  17. 
Holland,  bundling  in,  35, 
36. 


Illegitimacy  not  considered 
a  disgrace  in  Scotland, 
131. 

Kiltgang  in  canton  of  Lu- 
cerne, 39. 

Kweesten,  a  Dutch  custom, 
36. 


La  Hon  tan,  Indian  custom 
described  by,  41. 

Lichtgetren,  in  Switzer- 
land, 39. 

Love  and  courtship  in  the 
14tli  century,  37. 


Maine,  bundling  in,  1838, 
118. 

Marriage  laws  of  Great 
Britain,  royal  commis- 
sion on,  127. 

Marriage,  Welsh  laws  re- 
lating to,  24. 


Namzat  beze,  an  African 
custom,  43. 

Natural  children  legitima- 
tized in  Scotland,  18. 

New  bundling  song,  a,  81. 

New  England,  bundling  in, 
48. 

New     song    in     favor    of 
courting,  a,  88. 

New  York  Supreme  Court 
on  bundling.  111. 

N.   Am.   Indians,    chastity 
of,  41-53. 
courtship  among,  41. 


Pennsylvania,  bundling  in, 
109. 

Poem  against  bundling,  a, 
100. 

Polygamy  among   ancient 
nations,  15. 
in    Great  Britain,    15. 

Prostitutes,  punishment  of 
in  Scotland  and  Ger- 
many, 31. 


138 


Index. 


Public  confession  of    un- 
lawful   cohabitation 
made  in  New  Eng- 
land, 75. 
records  of,  75. 


Quest,    definition    of    and 

origin,  35. 
Queesting,  35. 


Royal  commission  on  mar- 
riage laws  of  Great 
Britain,  127. 


Savage    nations,    amatory 

customs  of,  40. 
Scotland,  courtship  of,  128. 
conjugal  infidelity  in, 

17. 
admonition  by  church 
of,  133. 
Scotch    and    Irish    moral 

character,  22. 
Scott,  Walter,  mention  of 

bundling  by,  20. 
Stubetcgetren    in    Switzer- 
land, 39. 
Sutherland,  son  of  a  hand- 
fast  marriage  claims  earl- 
dom of,  19. 


Switzerland,  courtship  In, 
88. 


Tarrying,  common  in  Eng- 
land, 64. 
in  New  England,  70. 
Texel,     bundling     in     the 
island  of,  36. 


United  States,  bundling  in 
the,  44. 


Vlie  and  Wieringen,  bund- 
ling practiced  in  islands 
of,  35. 


Wales,  bundling  in,  23. 
described  by  Bingley, 
28;   by  Barbor,  30; 
by    Carr,     32;     by 
Pratt,  25. 
chastity  in,  115, 
Welsh  laws  relating  to  mar- 
riage, 24. 
Whore  on  the  snow  crust, 

the,  93. 
Wieringen,  see  Vlie. 
Wynet-werth,     a     Welsh 
term,  35. 


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